Karnam Malleswari (born 1 June 1975) is an Indian former weightlifter. At the Sydney Olympics in 2000 she won a bronze medal, becoming the first Indian woman to win a medal at the Olympic Games. She had earlier been world champion twice. She is known as the Iron Lady of Indian sport.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Karnam Malleswari |
| Born | 1 June 1975, Voosavanipeta, Srikakulam district, Andhra Pradesh |
| Age | 51 |
| Sport | Weightlifting |
| Olympic medal | Bronze, 69 kg, Sydney 2000 |
| World Championships | Gold (1994, 1995); bronze (1993, 1996) |
| Asian Games | Silver (1994, 1998) |
| Awards | Arjuna Award (1994), Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna (1995), Padma Shri (1999) |
| Spouse | Rajesh Tyagi (m. 1997) |
| Children | 1 |
Early Life
She was born in a village in the Srikakulam district of coastal Andhra Pradesh, one of five children; her father was a constable in the Railway Protection Force. Her elder sister was training as a weightlifter at a local gymnasium run by the coach Neelamshetty Appanna. When twelve-year-old Malleswari asked to join, she was told she was too thin. Her mother encouraged her to keep going, and within a year she was lifting more than girls much older.
Career
Rise
In 1990, at a national camp, she was noticed by the Soviet-born coach Leonid Taranenko, a former Olympic champion, who had her sent for training at the Sports Authority of India centre in Bangalore. That year she broke nine national records in the junior nationals.
World champion
- **1993, Melbourne:** bronze medal at the World Championships
- **1994, Istanbul:** gold in the 54 kg class, the first Indian woman to become a world champion in weightlifting
- **1995, Guangzhou:** gold again, with a world record in the clean and jerk
- **1996:** bronze
She also won silver medals at the Asian Games of 1994 and 1998. In all she won twenty-nine international medals, eleven of them gold.
Sydney, 2000
Women’s weightlifting entered the Olympic programme for the first time at Sydney. Malleswari had moved up two weight classes to 69 kg and had not won a major title for four years; some commentators at home had written her off. She lifted 110 kg in the snatch and 130 kg in the clean and jerk, a total of 240 kg, for the bronze medal. Trying for gold on her last lift, she attempted 137.5 kg and failed. She said afterwards that she was sorry not to have won it.
It was India’s only medal of those Games.
Last years
She took a break to have a child and returned for the Athens Olympics of 2004, but a back injury ended her competition without a valid lift. She retired.
After Sport
She worked for the Food Corporation of India, rising to a senior post, and set up an academy for weightlifters. In 2021 the Delhi government appointed her the first Vice-Chancellor of the Delhi Sports University.
Honours
- Arjuna Award (1994)
- Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna (1995)
- Padma Shri (1999)
Personal Life
In 1997 she married Rajesh Tyagi, a fellow weightlifter from Haryana. They have a son and live at Yamunanagar in Haryana. A Telugu film about her life was announced in 2020.
Legacy
After her came the Indian women who have won Olympic medals in boxing, badminton, wrestling, weightlifting and shooting, among them Mary Kom, Saina Nehwal and P. V. Sindhu. She was the first.
Featured image: Karnam Malleswari with the Olympic flame at Humayun’s Tomb during the torch relay in New Delhi, June 2004. Photo by Government of India, licensed under Government Open Data License – India, via Wikimedia Commons.
