In a landmark gesture befitting a landmark triumph, Tata Motors has honoured the Indian women’s cricket team by gifting each member of the ICC Women’s ODI World Cup 2025-winning squad a brand-new Tata Sierra, celebrating India’s maiden ICC title at the senior level in the women’s game.
Just days after Harmanpreet Kaur’s India defeated Laura Wolvaardt’s South Africa by 52 runs in the final of the 13th edition of the ICC Women’s ODI World Cup at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai, the World Cup-winning squad lined up once more, this time alongside N. Chandrasekaran, Chairman of Tata Sons and Tata Motors Passenger Vehicles Ltd (TMPVL), and Shailesh Chandra, Managing Director and CEO of TMPVL, to be felicitated and handed the keys to the newly launched Tata Sierra.
“The Company will be presenting the top-end model of the Sierra to each member of the team, applauding their indomitable spirit and recognising their immense contribution and sacrifice in bringing glory to the country,” Tata Motors said in an official statement on Thursday, November 6. The announcement, which had been made soon after the final, underlined corporate India’s growing recognition of women’s cricket as a prime driver of sporting pride and aspiration.
India’s 52-run win over South Africa on Sunday, November 2, in Navi Mumbai did much more than add a trophy to the cabinet. Under skipper Harmanpreet Kaur and head coach Amol Muzumdar, the side clinched India’s first-ever ICC title at the senior level in the women’s game, ending a decades-long wait that had spanned multiple near-misses and heartbreaks on the global stage. Hosting the 13th edition of the ICC Women’s ODI World Cup from 30th September to 2nd November 2025 across India and Sri Lanka, the home side embraced the weight of expectation and turned it into fuel.
The final at DY Patil Stadium, in front of a packed and partisan crowd, was a culmination of years of incremental progress and quiet resolve. Powered by a brisk 87 from the explosive Shafali Verma at the top and a match-defining five-wicket haul from Deepti Sharma with the ball, India outplayed South Africa, led by skipper Laura Wolvaardt, in a high-pressure contest that rarely felt out of the hosts’ control. The 52-run margin reflected India’s dominance, but the significance ran much deeper: this was a team that had finally found a way to finish the story.
With the triumph, Harmanpreet Kaur joined an elite club of Indian captains, becoming only the third to lift the 50-over World Cup for the country, after Kapil Dev in 1983 and MS Dhoni in 2011. That the moment arrived on home soil, and in the women’s game, heightened its emotional resonance. The sight of Harmanpreet raising the trophy was more than a celebration; it was a rewriting of India’s cricketing narrative to firmly include the women’s team in the pantheon of World Cup legends.
India’s World Cup success arrives at a crucial juncture for the women’s game globally. The 10th edition of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup is set to be hosted by England and Wales from 12th June to 5th July 2026, a tournament that now has the potential to see India enter not as perennial underdogs or dark horses, but as reigning 50-over world champions. Harmanpreet’s tenure, already defined by aggressive intent and a willingness to back youth, suddenly has the gravitas of a global trophy behind it.
Before that T20 World Cup challenge, India will dive straight back into action, hosting Sri Lanka, led by the ever-dangerous Chamari Athapaththu, for a five-match T20I bilateral series from 21st to 30th December 2025. That series, coming on the heels of the ODI World Cup ecstasy, will serve as the first step in transitioning from a 50-over high to a T20 recalibration.
As the calendar accelerates towards the Sri Lanka T20I series, the 4th WPL, and the 10th ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in England and Wales, India will move on to new challenges and fresh narratives. But the 2025 ODI World Cup win and the Tata Sierra gesture that followed, has already done their most important work. It has reset expectations, redrawn boundaries, and ensured that when we list Indian World Cup captains, Kapil Dev, MS Dhoni, and Harmanpreet Kaur, we do so with equal pride, regardless of gender.
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