Mumbai: The Indian women’s cricket team may have made an early exit from the Women’s T20 World Cup 2026, but the country will still take part in the tournament’s most important tournament in a historic fashion.Vrinda Rathi from Nirul, Navi Mumbai, has been appointed by the International Cricket Council (ICC) as one of the on-field umpires for Sunday’s Women’s T20 World Cup final between hosts England and Australia at the iconic Lord’s Cricket Ground. She will host alongside Jacqueline Williams.Rati’s appointment marks a major milestone as she becomes the first Indian female referee to officiate in a Women’s World Cup final. She is also the second Indian referee to attend an International ICC World Cup final after Ram Babu Gupta, who along with Pakistan’s Mahboob Shah officiated the 1987 Men’s World Cup final at the Eden Gardens. Meanwhile, match referee GS Lakshmi officiated the 2023 and 2024 Women’s T20 World Cup finals.Ratti, 37, has had an impressive umpiring career, having featured in 20 women’s one-day internationals, 77 women’s T20 internationals and one women’s Test match.“She is a good, hard-working umpire. She is one of the top umpires in the ICC women’s panel. She was originally a scorer. Later, at my insistence, she became an umpire. I told her, ‘You can pursue a career in umpiring.’ In 2014, Rati cleared the umpiring examination conducted by the Mumbai Cricket Association and four years later, by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (2018). Within a year (2020), she was promoted to a member of the ICC Referees Development Group along with Narayanan Janani. “Ganesh Iyer, a former BCCI umpire and former chairman of the Mumbai Cricket Association’s Umpires Committee, told TOI.Before taking up umpiring, Rati was a medium-pacer player who represented the Mumbai University women’s team for four years, although she failed to make it to the Mumbai senior women’s team.In December 2023, Rati created history when she became the first Indian woman to officiate a women’s Test match in a one-off Test match between India and England at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai.She rose quickly through the ranks of referees. In 2022, she officiated at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham. On January 10, 2023, she along with Janani Narayanan became one of the first women to officiate on-field umpiring in men’s domestic matches in India, officiating the Ranji Trophy match between Goa and Puducherry City.In 2023, Ratti also officiated the Women’s T20 World Cup in South Africa, entered the finals of the first Women’s Super League, and served as a member of the referee team for the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China.
