| Jwala Gutta | |
|---|---|
| Personal information | |
| Born | September 7, 1983 Wardha, Maharastra, India |
| Height | 1.78 m (5 ft 10 in)[1] |
| Country | India |
| Handedness | Left |
| Coach | S. M. Arif |
| Mixed Doubles / Women's Doubles | |
| Highest Ranking | 6 |
| Current Ranking | 21 (June 23, 2011) |
| Olympic medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
| Competitor for India | ||
| Women's Badminton | ||
| World Championships | ||
| Bronze | 2011 London | Women's doubles |
| Commonwealth Games | ||
| Silver | 2010 Delhi | Mixed Team |
| Gold | 2010 Delhi | Women's Doubles |
| Gold | 2010 Delhi | Mixed Doubles |
Jwala Gutta (Telugu: గుత్తా జ్వాలా) is a left-handed Indian badminton player of mixed Chinese and Indian descent who has won the National Badminton Championships thirteen times until 2010. She is one of the best women's doubles badminton players produced by India in recent times, partnering with Shruti Kurien and later Ashwini Ponnappa. She was the wife of Chetan Anand, an Arjuna Awardee; however, the two divorced in 2011.[2]
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Jwala was born on 7 September 1983 in Wardha, Maharashtra and brought up in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India, to an Telugu father and a Chinese mother. Jwala's father, Kranti Gutta, hailed from a family of freedom fighters and Leftists.[3] Her mother, Yelan Gutta, was born in Tianjin, and is a granddaughter of Gandhian named Tseng. Yelan first came to India in 1977 with her grandfather to visit the Sevagram ashram, where he translated Gandhi's autobiography and other works into Chinese language.[4] She married Kranti in 1982 and settled in Hyderabad in 1988.[5]
In the doubles event though, her performance has been better as entered the Semi Final round of her second International Doubles tournament, the India Asia Satellite tournament 2002. She also reached the Semi Final round of the Indian Asian Satellite tournament 2004, and finished Runner Up at the LE VOLANT D’OR Tournament, known as TOULOUSE Open in the year 2004. Further, she reached the Final Rounds of the Scottish International tournament 2004 and 40th Portuguese Badminton Championship 2004. In the year 2006 she won the Sri Lanka International Satellite tournament while in the year 2007 she won the Cyprus Badminton International tournament. The same year, she also won at the Pakistan International Challenge tournament and the Indian International Challenge tournament. Apart from these achievements, Jwala won the Nepal International Series tournament 2008 and Yonex Dutch Open Grand Prix 2008 in the Women’s Doubles category. She won a Gold medal in Women Doubles in Commonwealth Games 2010 making history of winning the 1st gold medal in women doubles. Later on this year she again made a history by being the 1st women doubles pair to win a bronze medal in world championships 2011.
In the Mixed Doubles category too, Jwala has shown her excellence as she has grabbed the titles in the Jakarta Satellite tournament and Welsh International tournament in the year 2005, Sri Lanka International Satellite tournament, Cyprus Badminton International tournament and Indian International Challenge tournament in the year 2007, and Nepal International Series tournament, Bitburger Open Grand Prix tournament and KLRC Bulgaria Open Grand Prix tournament in the year 2008. But the latest achievement in December 2009 where she and her mixed doubles partner Diju reached the World Super Series masters final in Malaysia, where they went down to world championship bronze medalists Christinna Pedersen and Joaquim Nielsen 21-14, 21-18.Jwala also won a gold medal in the prestigious Commonwealth Games 2010 which was held in India.
During her Badminton career, Jwala Gutta began dating fellow badminton player Chetan Anand, who was the 1999 Junior National Badminton Champion and 2003, 2007, 2008, and 2010 Senior National Badminton Champion and has been honored with an Arjuna Award. The couple married on 17 July 2005 and got divorced on 29th June 2011.