When the Indian table tennis squad for the 2026 Asian Games was announced, there was a furore around the exclusion of Manika Batra, who was named amongst the reserves. The star paddler put out a statement and challenged the authorities, her reaction there for the public eye to see.
Another prominent name didn’t make the cut: Ayhika Mukherjee. But there wasn’t a peep from her, perhaps because she knew that she wouldn’t be travelling to Aichi-Nagoya in Japan for her third Asiad.
“I didn’t have much of a reaction because maybe deep down, I knew that I wasn’t going to get selected. Indian ranking tournaments are given more heft here, more than world ranking, but I just couldn’t participate last year because I was bedridden. Otherwise, I usually play the ranking tournaments,” she told Sportstar on the sidelines of the seventh edition of Ultimate Table Tennis in Goa.
As per the selection criteria laid down by the Table Tennis Federation of India (TTFI), weightage was given to performance at national ranking tournaments. In Manika’s case too, her ineligibility stemmed from her not playing at those ranking events.
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For Ayhika, exhaustion-induced illness kept her away from the table for a long time, during which she missed the ranking tournaments.
“Last February, I blacked out in China while playing at the Asia Cup. I rested for a bit, but with the Asian Games and World Championships this year, I was just pushing myself. But in August-September, I wasn’t even able to pick up my racquet. My blood pressure had dropped to 63-65. It could have been excessive travelling. Right from the Asian Games (in 2023) and then the Paris Olympics, the schedule was disrupted after Covid-19. I just couldn’t get enough rest,” Ayhika, who won that historic women’s doubles bronze medal with Sutirtha Mukherjee at the last Asian Games, revealed.
Ayhika hoped that this selection system would be changed in the future.
“When we go out there and play at the Asian Games, we have to compete against the Japanese and Chinese, and not players from Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra. The world ranking should be looked at a bit more because we’re all habituated to playing each other in the domestic circuit. The No. 1 ranked player can lose to No. 32; that’s how much we know each other. There are some players who thrive in pressure situations at these tournaments more than others,” she said.
While she might not travel for the Asian Games, her focus remains clear: to keep improving her world ranking.
“After my illness, I didn’t really play a lot of tournaments. It was from this January that I started getting back to the table. I’ve won a silver and two gold medals with Sutirtha in doubles and have done well in singles also. I just want to keep improving my world ranking and also work on my national ranking. But my focus will be on the bigger picture. This is something I’ve learnt from Manika,” Ayhika signed off.
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Published on Jul 23, 2026