Your Own Child, It's Something Magical: Virat Kohli On Fatherhood

Captain Virat Kohli on fatherhood: Virat Kohli on Wednesday shared his experience of becoming a father and his experience with parenting during an interaction on Forbes India Leadership Awards 2021.

“It's been an amazing amazing time. Ever since I came back from Australia, just to be able to be present for the birth of our daughter was something that is very difficult to explain in words something that I will cherish it for the rest of my life," said the captain of the Indian men’s cricket team. Kohli went on paternity leave after the first Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against Australia before the birth of his first child in January 2021.

"I would not have missed it for anything in the world. Unless you are there, you cannot understand the impact it has on you as a human being to witness the life being born and your own child, it's something magical,” Kohli, who is now in between training session ahead of the Twenty20 International (T20I) series against England, said.

Kohli added that while he had to leave the company of his wife Anushka Sharma and his daughter Vamika to resume his captaincy duties, he is still "fully committed and fully tuned in for doing the responsibilities of becoming a parent."

"I don’t think anything seems that difficult. I had to leave after 17-18 days. But I understand how things are and I would have loved to be right beside Anushka for the time that I was away. But now the family is with me, so I'm helping wherever I can. Once you are in that space, I don't think seem like that difficult, so I am just relishing and enjoying every moment of it," Kohli told Forbes.

He recently posted an adorable picture of Sharma with their baby daughter on the occasion of International Women’s Day. “Seeing the birth of a child is the most spine chilling, unbelievable and amazing experience a human being can have. After witnessing that, you understand the true strength and divinity of women and why God created life inside them. It’s because they are way stronger than us men. Happy Women’s Day to the most fiercely, compassionate and strong woman of my life and to the one who’s going to grow up to be like her mother. And, also a Happy Women’s Day to all the amazing women of the world,” Kohli wrote in his Instagram post.

Kohli and Sharma, who welcomed their first child on January 11, recently took their month-old baby daughter to her first cricket match in Ahmedabad.

Feature Image Credit: Anushka Sharma/Instagram