Children from deprived backgrounds are finding their way into the Indian Navy’s top youth sailing team, starting at Hyderabad’s Hussain Sagar and now training at INS Mandovi in Goa
Dreams caught the wind at the Langkawi Youth International Regatta in Malaysia, where Telangana’s junior sailors of Yacht Club of Hyderabad, delivered their finest international performance to date. Facing top-tier competitors from China, Hong Kong, Thailand, and across Southeast Asia, the Indian contingent returned with nine medals, five of them from Telangana alone, including a gold and two silvers.
“I’ve never been prouder of our team,” says Suheim Sheikh, founder of the Yacht Club and coach to many of the medalists. “We’ve come back with five sailors on the podium. That’s never happened before. Until now, our best was a single bronze in Oman.”
Seventeen-year-old Thanuja Kameshwar from Rasoolpura, along with her sailing partner Shravan Kathrawath, clinched gold in the Under-19 International 420 mixed doubles class, edging past their clubmates, Deekshita Komaravelly and Ganesh Peerkatla, who secured silver. “We had just finished racing at the Monsoon Regatta in Hyderabad,” Thanuja says. “That kept us sharp. We were race-ready by the time we landed in Malaysia.”
But perhaps the most panoramic record was that of 14-year-old Lahiri Komaravelly, Deekshita’s younger sister. She was on track for gold in the U-15 Optimist class until a heartbreaking error — misreading a flag signal and returning to the start line after leading the fleet. She dropped to 28th in that race, but bounced back to finish 10th overall among 81 sailors and took home silver. She remains India’s No. 1-ranked sailor in her category.
Three of the club’s most promising young sailors — Mohd Rizwan, Dhoki Sathwik, and Naveen — have been inducted into the Navy Youth Sports Company (NYSC) and are currently training at INS Mandovi in Goa. Of the trio, Rizwan lives with his mother in a tin-roofed hut by the MMTS tracks. Sathwik’s father is a vegetable vendor. Naveen was found wandering alone in Prakasam district as a child, later placed in a shelter home, and discovered by Suheim’s team just last year. “He didn’t even know where he came from — just that he remembered going to church as a boy,” Suheim recalls. “But he took to sailing like a fish to water.”
The team is now back from Malaysia. The next big international events are in Singapore and Oman, and some students may travel abroad for individual training stints. “We’ll continue pushing them — into sport, into academics, into life,” says Suheim. “This isn’t about privilege. It’s about possibility.”
