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Documentary ‘Limitless’ encourages women to sprint past their challenges

Documentary ‘Limitless’ encourages women to sprint past their challenges

The film has been commissioned by the India Amateur Runners Trust and directed by Vrinda Samartha.
26 Nov, 2016

“Were you embarrassed when I was running?” Mandira asks her daughter.

“Yea,” the girl replies.

“Why?”

“Because no one else’s mom runs,” says the daughter.

Mandira is one of many women featured the documentary Limitless, about the challenges faced by female runners in India. Indian women comprise 11.7 per cent of all marathon runners in the country, as opposed to the global average of 29.76 per cent. “To get women to participate is great, but they face several obstacles in the way,” said Ashok Nath, executive trustee of India Amateur Runners Trust, which commissioned the film. “Women make up such a small percentage of the numbers that if you want to grow the running space, you need to encourage more women to participate.”

The 60-minute film, directed by Vrinda Samartha, features eight women from different social strata, including a woman from Mumbai who worked as a household help and now earns her living by participating in running events. Also on the list is Viji Swaminathan, who once had to fight off drunken men when she went out for a run. Swaminathan now runs in groups with men.

The film highlights the obstacles navigated by women on the streets as well as at home. “A woman feels that there are so many things to do that if she does anything for herself, she feels guilty,” Nath pointed out.

An older runner, Sharda, had to persuade her mother and mother-in-law to come around and accept her passion for the sport. “Women end up seeking acceptance from people around,” Samartha said. “There is also someone like Mandira, who wanted someone much younger than her to understand her, and then there is Sharda who wanted people older than her to cooperate.”

The film also features Saloni Arora, a 32-year old runner from Bangalore, who says, “My father is my biggest support who encouraged me throughout. Taking up a professional sport like long distance running takes a lot out of you physically and mentally. So a strong support system is very important.”

Each of the characters started small but are now professional runners, having participated in half and full marathons. They assert that running is not only for professionals. Swaminathan, who initially started running to lose weight and boost her self-esteem, told Scroll.in. “People should run for the love of it. It is a race against yourself.”

For Saloni Arora, running is about staying healthy. “Lives are very stressful these days, be it for working women, be it for women at home, family pressures are very immense, so it is very important to do something to stay fit,” she said.

Apart from fitness, running has improved other areas of the women’s lives. Arora, who took up running at the age of 30 when she was going through a divorce, says in the film, “I started running to clear my mind space and look for positivity.” She now wakes up at 4.30 am and goes to bed at 9 pm. “Running changes your day; you have a positive mindset, and you interact with positive people,” Arora says.

Nath believes that the documentary will show viewers, especially women interested in running, that it is possible to sprint past challenges. “They will realise that these are typical women like them, and that they should not restrain themselves too much.” Nath also hopes that the film will sensitise men to jeer less and cheer more. “I am not trying to change the world – I am just rolling the ball, hoping it will pick up pace,” Nath said.

Still from ‘Limitless’
Still from ‘Limitless’


This article, originally published at Scroll.in, has been reproduced with permission.

Comments

ahmed Nov 26, 2016 05:22pm
This is how the Indians project themselves the progressive nation the world over. They make the world believe that everyone speak English (indlish) in India. Reality is different.
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john dcosta Nov 26, 2016 05:42pm
@ahmed Grow up my friend, The population of India is 1.2billion . Atleast 500m speak ,write and talk good english ,especially the Urban population.And the scenes above are of urban population.
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Chandra Nov 26, 2016 05:53pm
Ahmed, We do have the largest number of English speakers in the world. And yes, inspite of all our problems -which you might be well aware of- we want to make progress.
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Kaffir Nov 26, 2016 06:39pm
@ahmed More people know and speak English , though not as well as in the film ,than the entire population of Pakistan, but we don't need to impress anybody we leave that to the Chinese and the Pakistanis, or as the character of Gandhi says in the film , " we know who we are , we don't need to to know what we are " When you are a continuing civilisation of over 4000 years ,with a religion and Languages as old and evolved , you don't need to prove anything , certainly not to converts . Nothing in this is staged, lots of women many many more run than shown , we are not China where everything is to fool the people and controlled . But does English matter ? it doesn't !
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Abhi Nov 26, 2016 07:09pm
@ahmed you need to visit and decide the change. Can't be one dimensional or obtuse about projections
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Princess_of_DHUMP Nov 26, 2016 07:37pm
@Ahmed @John both of you need to grow up. South Asia is in the process of accepting things that are considered normal in rest of the world - especially with regards to women. And English is definitely not a barometer to gauge how developed or progressive a country is.
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Hassan (Karachi) Nov 26, 2016 08:17pm
@john dcosta I apologize for my Pakistani friend here, doing pointless point scoring. This is great work and gives an insight to the urban (if I dare say, middle class/income) women population of India. Reminds me of the #GirlsAtDhabas / #WomenatDhabas group running in Pakistan, they also organised a cycling activity, to reclaim the city. I linked the article below, http://www.dawn.com/news/1248387
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Random Indian Nov 26, 2016 09:10pm
@ahmed Honestly nobody in the world sees English knowledge as a sign of development. China, Japan, Korea have developed without English, and we in India don't think English is going to help (or for that matter hurt) our chances to grow. It is a tool for communication, a reasonably effective one, that's all. In many parts of the country people don't speak Hindi which fact might have also been lost on you, so it's a film in a global language for the global audience.
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Abhai Rai Sharma Nov 26, 2016 10:53pm
@ahmed - jealous?
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Sumit Mazumdar Nov 26, 2016 11:19pm
@ahmed Did you read that one of the runners used to be a household help? I doubt that she speaks English. The article is not about speaking English, it is about running. But yes, one has to know English to read and comprehend it.
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iNDIAN IN us Nov 27, 2016 05:06am
@ahmed : English speaking population is very high in India especially in South and Northeast. Auto rickshaw drivers in southern cities like Chennai and Bangalore can even speak english and get by. North and West aren't that much English speaking. Once I went to Chennai and stayed at a hotel run by an elderly couple. The women was in her late 60s and spoke very fluent english. As a guy coming from north I was very surprised because she was my grandmother's age and I would have never expected my grandmother to speak this good english. As a big country, you get to see lot of variety here. We have people who work as laborers in Saudi and we also have people who run top tech firms in USA. That's what we are as a nation.
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Einstein Babar Nov 27, 2016 12:10pm
India has a craze to pretend as Americans, a famous author wrote that Indians lack sense of identity. Nations rise and fall, may be in future we will see them wearing red cloaks and drinking green tea while sitting on wooden block.
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Abx Nov 27, 2016 09:10pm
Indian are the new Americans wannabe.
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Iftikhar khan Nov 28, 2016 06:26am
Good job to all of those who pick up this wonderful sport. Hope it spreads more in both India and Pakistan. Good wishes on positive activity from Pakistan @Ahmed may be you need to start distance running as well. It does induce positive thoughts.
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Riaz khan Nov 28, 2016 07:33am
@ahmed The Indians can talk english,walk english, laugh in english and run in english. If you have any doubts watch 'Namak Halaal'
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