The Day I Became a Runner starts on a striking premise-that, since running is a solitary activity conducted in the public sphere, women who take up this sport pose a more direct challenge to patriarchy than those who play sports such as badminton, cricket and tennis. To support this thesis, award-winning journalist Sohini Chattopadhyay presents the stories of nine athletes spanning the history of independent India from the 1940s to the present moment.

Whether it is Ila Mitra, who could have been the first India-origin woman at the 1940 Olympics, P.T. Usha, who redefined the 1980s and the decades that followed, or Lalita Babar, the first Indian woman to make it to an individual Olympic track final after Usha, each of the women in this book is a remarkable figure of post-Independence India. The Day I Became a Runner posits a compelling, alternative account of the Indian republic chronicled through the lives of women athletes.