Pro Kabaddi has shown how to handle women's sport: Are you watching BCCI?

Winter had set in, and it was late in the evening. As the sun went down over the Hooghly river, the Australian cricket team went on a victory lap around the historic ground of Eden Gardens as 80,000 spectators cheered them on. It was a women's cricket match, it did not feature India, yet, the ground was filled to the brim. Rows and rows of Indian men and an almost equal number of women cheered on as Australia defeated New Zealand in the 1997 final to lift their fourth World Cup.

Since that merger (in 2007), the BCCI has organized just one Test match for the women's team.

In spirit, the BCCI should manage both the men's and women's cricket in this nation, but clearly the latter was forced upon them.

The advent of the Indian Premier League in 2008 changed the face of Indian domestic cricket. Superstar-backed franchises, world class foreign cricketers, cheerleaders, multilingual coverage—and suddenly the league started to generate more interest than even some of the International matches the national team was playing. Along with the interest, it also generated jaw-dropping volumes of cash.

Following IPL's popularity, Cricket Australia came up with the Big Bash League in 2011. In 2014, CA announced that a women's league is in the early stage of planning, and just a year later, the Women's Big Bash League came into existence. It turned out to be a huge success with the TV ratings exceeding well above the initial expectations.

The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) also rolled out an IPL-style league of their own in 2014—the NatWest T20 Blast. Next month, just two years since the formation of the men's league, ECB are set to start the Women's Cricket Super League, with six teams participating in the inaugural season.

The likes of Mithali Raj and Harmanpreet Kaur, now been signed by defending WBBL champions Sydney Thunder, shone through in that series, along with a host of young talents like Smriti Mandhana and Veda Krishnamurthy. Sadly though, many such young talents do not have the platform to make their mark in India presently.

The BCCI need not look beyond the border for guidance on how to handle women's sports though. Last night, just 7 kilometers north of the BCCI's headquarters in Churchgate, Mumbai, Firebirds and Ice Divas kicked off the Women's Kabaddi Challenge at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Stadium.

It was a spectacle which matched the men's match between Puneri Paltan and Dabang Delhi, which preceded it, and the background work, which ensured such a spectacle, was started two years ago.

However, their training was not limited to what they did on the court. The players were groomed to face the camera and media attention which would follow such a league and its players. From mock interviews and television appearances to manicures and pedicures—they left no stone unturned. The red streaks on the hair of the Firebirds' players were noticeable on Tuesday night, and it was an outcome of the styling regimen they were put under.

The players attended Zumba classes, and participated in dance-offs, in order to open up and gain the confidence of making public appearances. They were groomed to be stars, and only few months back, these women did not have anything but kabaddi in their lives.

Somehow, the women's teams, be it cricket, football, or hockey, are not considered to be a part of the national identity, that the masses so feverishly relate to when it comes to the men's teams.

Traditionally in India, women athletes have done better in individual sports than team sports. Both in terms of popularity and success. In fact, according to the last report published by ESP Properties-SportzPower, Sania Mirza, Saina Nehwal, and Mary Kom account for 40% of endorsements in non-cricket sports in India. However, with a glass-half-empty lens, it is a mere reflection of the general apathy towards women's team sports in this nation. Somehow, the women's teams, be it cricket, football, or hockey, are not considered to be a part of the national identity, that the masses so feverishly relate to when it comes to the men's teams.

With the World Cup being hosted in England next year, the BCCI missed out on a crucial chance to help the players get acclimatized with English conditions by allowing them to participate in the inaugural Women's Cricket Super League. The WCSL and WBBL teams have already acquired their squads, and will now only look to plug the gaps in the preceding seasons—which in turn means that there will be far less opportunities on offer for the Indian women players to play in these leagues.

The BCCI seemed to have missed the bus, but they can still catch the flight. Women's IPL is the need of the hour, and this Anurag Thakur-led regime is seemingly more open to the idea than its predecessors. The Pro Kabaddi League has done it with a sport that is not half as popular as cricket, and the BCCI should take notice-for once.