Anaya Bangar, daughter of India veteran cricketer and commentator Sanjay Bangar, has opened up on her struggles after undergoing a gender change surgery.In a recent interview on YouTube channel, ‘The Lallantop’, she revealed her horrifying experiences.Having started her cricket career at the age of 12 as Aryan Bangar, she played alongside some big players including Musheer Khan, Sarfaraz khan, and Yashasvi Jaiswal.Talking about her cricketing journey she said, “It was good. I’ve played for Mumbai Under-16, Pondicherry under-19, and Mumbai under-23 trails as a left hand batter and left arm spinner.”Speaking about nepotism in cricket, she said, ” To some extent it is there, you get the exposure easily but they will also have extra pressure.”However, she alleged that the cricket world is very toxic, “I’ve maintained Secrecy because dad is well known, the cricketing world is filled with insecure and toxic masculinity. The mindset you need to maintain to flourish in Indian cricket is quite a bit narcissistic and toxic.””It’s like in order to excel you need to be a version of yourself, where you need to be dominant but not in a healthy way of competition.”Admitting that she received support from few, Anaya also opened up on some disturbing experiences, “Yes, I am in touch with some players, there has been some support and there has been some harassment as well. There have been few cricketers, who played at a high level. On a random basis they found out about me and randomly sent me ‘nude pictures’.””While I was in the UK, few were supportive and those who were not supportive, they used to abuse me in front of my teammates and later came and sat with me and asked me to send my pictures.”Explaining further, she shared another traumatising experience, “I told a bade purane (Quite Old) cricketer about my situation and the next thing he said was let’s go to your car, I want to sleep with you.””I just want people to treat us with respect and treat us as equal human beings,” she lamented.Last year, Anaya came out publicly about her gender-identity with a painful Instagram post, where she expressed grief over losing her athletic abilities due to hormone replacement therapy.
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