Indian archer Atanu Das, who on Thursday proved a point by knocking out two-time Olympic champion, is married to world number one archer Deepika
Kumari. Their love story began in 2008 when they studied together at the Tata
Academy located in Jamshedpur. They did not really start off as friends at the
academy. Atanu did not know Hindi back then so he didn’t talk to Deepika, she was quoted as saying by the official Olympics website.

Also Read| Mirabai Chanu plans to change the colour of medal to gold in 2024 Paris Games

Then slowly
and steadily when they got to know each other, they faced a lot of hardships,
communication gaps, ego problems and big misunderstandings. Das became
nostalgic and told about their childish fights. There arguments involved
literally anything, as stupid as ‘Why did you take my water bottle?’

Both of them
took a part in the in the Rio Olympics in 2016 and yet they weren’t even near
to dating. Finally in 2017- almost a decade after they met, love struck the two
of them. The two bonded over a lot of soul searching when Indian recurved team’s
heavy defeat in the 2017 World Championships in Mexico City.

Also Read| Debutant Satish Kumar sails into Olympic boxing quarterfinals; unlucky Mary Kom bows out

Antanu
Das recalled that they bonded a lot while shopping and in that moment none of
their doubts, misunderstandings and differences mattered.  

The couple preferred to keep
their relationship lowkey because they did not want the other archers and teammates to know
about it. “We only made it public around the time we got engaged in December
(2018),” Atanu told ESPN. 

Also Read | ‘So cute’, Mirabai Chanu gushes over her little fan

Atanu
Das And Deepika Kumari had planned to get married after the Tokyo Olympics in
2020. However, after the Games got postponed by a year due to the horrific
pandemic, they altered their plans and got married on June 30 last year. The
ceremony took place in Deepika’s hometown, Ranchi.

As of today, the ‘Dee-Das’
couple is the first Indian Couple to take part in the same discipline in an Olympic
Games. In fact, they are only the second married Indian couple to battle at the
Olympics together – the first being Vece Paes and his wife in the 1972
Olympics. Look out for this sports couple making history together.