Ekta Bisht (Born on 8 February 1986 in Almora, Uttarakhand) is an Indian left handed batswoman and slow left-arm orthodox bowler. Ekta was the first International woman cricketer from Uttarakhand state. Ekta Bisht also the first Indian Woman cricketer to take a hat-trick in a Women's Twenty20 International match.
Ekta started playing cricket at the age of six. Ekta would play the sport with boys, which often drew an audience as she was the only girl on a male team. Ekta Bisht was the captain of Kumaon University in North zone. In 2006, Ekta became captain of the Uttarakhand cricket team. Ekta played for the Uttar Pradesh cricket team from 2007 to 2010. Ekta had been mentored by Liyakat Ali in her early years.
In 2011, Ekta was selected for the India women's national cricket team and made her WODI debut on 2 July 2011 against Australia. On 3 October 2012 in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Ekta Bisht took a hat-trick in the match of the ICC World Women Twenty20. Ekta was member of the Indian team to reach the final of the 2017 Women's Cricket World Cup. In December 2017, Ekta Bisht was named as one of the players in both the ICC Women's ODI Team of the Year and the ICC Women's T20I Team of the Year. Ekta was the only woman named in both squads.
In 2017 Women's Cricket World Cup, Ekta Bisht claimed 5 wickets in 18 runs against Pakistan, leading India to win by 95 runs. With this, she broke her own record of 5 wickets in 8 runs against Colombo in February 2017. Ekta Bisht was also Joint second highest wicket taker in ODI's in 2017 at an average of 17.27 with 29 wickets in 16 matches. In November 2017, the Uttarakhand government decided to confer the year's Khel Ratna award to bowler Ekta Bisht and Dronacharya Award to her coach Liyakat Ali Khan.
In October 2018, Ekta Bisht was named in India's squad for the 2018 ICC Women's World Twenty20 tournament in the West Indies. On November 2018, Ekta has had 79 ODI wickets and 50 T20I wickets averaging 21.98 and 14.50 respectively. Ekta Bisht is the fifth Indian woman to cross the 100 wicket mark with 129 international wickets and India's fifth highest wicket taker in ODI's and third highest in T20I's.
