Harmanpreet Kaur

Harmanpreet Kaur Bhullar (born 8 March 1989) is an Indian cricketer who captains the India women's national team. She is a top order batter and a right-arm off-spin bowler. She captained the Indian team that won the 2025 Women's Cricket World Cup, the Women's Asia Cup in 2012, 2016 and 2022, and gold medal in the 2022 Asian Games. Under her captaincy, the Indian women's team achieved its first bilateral Women's One Day International win in England since 1999 in 2022, first-ever Test victory over Australia in 2023, and the first Women's Twenty20 International (WT20I) series win against England in 2025. She was a member of the Indian team that won the silver medal in the 2022 Commonwealth Games.

Harmanpreet has scored more than 8,000 runs in international cricket. In 2018, she became the first Indian to score a century in a WT20I match. In 2019, during the home series against South Africa, she became the first Indian cricketer to play in 100 T20 International matches. In 2023, she became the first Indian to score more than 3,000 runs in WT20Is. As of 2025^[update], she is one of the only three Indian women to score more than 3,000 runs in Women's One Day Internationals. She also holds the record for the most runs scored in World Cup knockout matches (331 runs).

Harmanpreet captains Mumbai Indians in the Women's Premier League (WPL), and led them to WPL titles in 2023 and 2025. In 2016, she became the first Indian woman to be signed by an overseas T20 franchise after joining Sydney Thunder in the Australian Women's Big Bash League (WBBL). She led the Supernovas in the Indian Women's T20 Challenge to titles in 2018, 2019, and 2022. She has played for Melbourne Renegades in the WBBL, Manchester Originals and Trent Rockets in The Hunded.

Harmanpreet was awarded the Arjuna Award by the Government of India in 2017. In 2023, she was named as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the Year, and was the first Indian woman to be featured in the list. She was also named as part of Time 100 Next, and BBC's 100 Women in the same year.

Harmanpreet Kaur was born on 8 March 1989 in Moga, Punjab, to Harmandar Singh Bhullar and Satwinder Kaur. Her father was a former sportsman, and later worked as a clerk at a local judicial court. She has a younger sister, Hemjeet Kaur. While she claimed to have obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree from Chaudhary Charan Singh University in Meerut, later investigation by the Punjab Police, after her honorary appointment as a deputy superintendent of police, revealed no such records. As per one of her acquaintances, she studied at the Hans Raj Mahila Maha Vidyalaya college of the Guru Nanak Dev University in Jalandhar, Punjab.

Harmanpreet took to cricket after joining the Gian Jyoti School Academy, about 30 km (19 mi) away from her residence, and trained under Kamaldeesh Singh Sodhi. She played with men during the formative days of her career. In 2014, she moved to Mumbai and began working for the Indian Railways.

In early 2009, Harmanpreet was named in the Indian team for the 2009 World Cup. She made her WODI debut aged 20 against Pakistan at Bradman Oval during the World Cup. In the match, she bowled four overs conceding 10 runs and took a catch. She played six matches in the World Cup, scoring 42 runs across three innings. In June 2009, she made her Twenty20 International debut in the 2009 edition of the ICC Women's World Twenty20 against England at Taunton, in which she scored eight runs off seven balls.

During England's tour of India in 2009-10, she played two WODIs and three WT20Is. She scored her first half-century in WODIs in the series on 1 March 2010. In the WT20 series that followed, she scored 74 runs across three matches. She was noted for her ability to hit the ball a long way during a quick-fire innings of 33 runs in the second WT20I game of the series.