Bula Choudhury (born 2 January 1970, Hugli, India) is an Indian former swimmer. She is an
Arjuna awardee,
Padma shri awardee, former India national women's swimming champion and elected as
MLA from 2006 to 2011 representing
Nandanpur in
West Bengal
West Bengal (, Bengali: ''Poshchim Bongo'', , abbr. WB) is a state in the eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabitants within an area of . West Bengal is the fou ...
state of
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
.
Swimming career
Her first national competition, at age nine, she dominated her age group by winning six gold medals in six events. She continued to improve, winning various junior and national championships, as well as six gold medals at the 1991
South Asian Federation Games
The South Asian Games (SAG or SA Games), formerly known as the South Asian Federation Games (SAFG or SAF Games), is a quadrennial multi-sport event held among the athletes from South Asia. The governing body of these games is South Asia Olympic ...
. She went to her first nationals, at the age of 12, which is an all-time record. This also guaranteed her a place in the relay quartet for the Brisbane Commonwealth Games as well as a prominent place on the list of Asiad probables.
In 1984 she set a national 100m butterfly record of 1:06.19 sec. During the Seoul Asian Games in 1986, she created a record of 1:05.27 sec in 100m butterfly and another record of 2:19.60 sec in 200m butterfly.
Choudhury started long-distance swimming in 1989 and crossed the English Channel that year. She won the 81-km (50- mile) Murshidabad Long Distance Swim in 1996, and in 1999 she crossed the English Channel again. In August, 2004, she set this record by swimming across the Palk Straits from Talaimannar in Sri Lanka to Dhanushkodi in Tamil Nadu in nearly 14 hours.
She became the first woman to have swum across sea channels off five continents in 2005 —including the Strait of Gibraltar, the Tyrrhenian Sea, Cook Strait, Toroneos Gulf (Gulf of Kassándra) in Greece, the Catalina Channel off the California coast, and from Three Anchor Bay to Robben Island near Cape Town, South Africa. She created a record for swimming the 30 km track in 3 hours & 26 minutes. She is now is planning to establish a swimming academy in
Kolkata
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...
.
Awards and distinctions
* First woman to cross
seven seas
The "Seven Seas" is a figurative term for all the seas of the known world. The phrase is used in reference to sailors and pirates in the arts and popular culture and can be associated with the Mediterranean Sea, the Arabian Seven Seas east of Af ...
.
* Twice swam the
English Channel
The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" (Cotentinais) or ( Jèrriais), (Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Kana ...
first in 1989 and again in 1999.
*
Arjuna Award in 1990.
*
Padma Shri
Padma Shri ( IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conf ...
award.
*
Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award 2002
See also
*
Swimming in India
*
List of Indian records in swimming
*
Kutraleeswaran
References
India Info page on BulaTimes of India article
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Choudhury, Bula
1970 births
Living people
Indian female swimmers
Indian female freestyle swimmers
Indian female butterfly swimmers
Indian female long-distance swimmers
Swimmers from West Bengal
Sportswomen from West Bengal
English Channel swimmers
Cook Strait swimmers
Recipients of the Arjuna Award
People from Hooghly district
Recipients of the Padma Shri in sports
Recipients of the Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award
Women in West Bengal politics
Communist Party of India (Marxist) politicians from West Bengal
West Bengal MLAs 2006–2011
Women members of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly
South Asian Games gold medalists for India
South Asian Games medalists in swimming
Indian sportsperson-politicians
20th-century Indian women
20th-century Indian people
21st-century Indian women politicians
21st-century Indian politicians