TheIndian Women's League (abbreviated as theIWL) is thewomen's toptier professionalfootball league in India, founded in 2016.[1] Currently, a total of 8 teams from across the country participate in the league.[2]
The competition was planned since 2014 and got established in 2016, with the first season starting from October 2016 inCuttack,Odisha.[3] The league was launched as India's first professional football league for women with the aim to increase the player pool forIndia national team. Since2019–20, the clubs that become champions are granted an opportunity to play in theAFC Women's Club Championship, the top tier women's club football competition inAsia.
In 2014, after the success of theIndia women's team, mainly in theSAFF Women's Championship, a push to start a women's football league, along the lines of recently inaugurated and successfulIndian Super League, happened.[7] Clubs such asPune andBengaluru expressed interests in joining a national women's league.[7] It was around this time that AIFF started plans to create a league for women along the lines of ISL.[8]
On 21 April 2016, the AIFF presidentPraful Patel said that Indian Women's League would kick-off in October with six teams to be decided, and goal to expand to eight teams by 2017.[3] Over two months later, on 5 July, AIFF organized a workshop to discuss the India women's national team and proposed women's football league. FiveIndian Super League sides –Delhi Dynamos,Chennaiyin,Kerala Blasters, Pune City andAtletico de Kolkata, and threeI-League sides – Bengaluru,Aizawl andMumbai, attended the workshop. It was announced that the league would feature eight teams and two other spots would be determined through a preliminary round.[9] The primary objective of the tournament was to capitalise the potential of Indian women and prepare them for thenational team, so as to eventually qualify forAFC Women's Asian Cup andFIFA Women's World Cup.[10]
Thepreliminary round of the inaugural season was played from 17 to 26 October inCuttack by 8 teams qualifying through a national qualifier of 20 teams across the country, and the main round of six teams took place the following year from 28 January to 14 February inNew Delhi.[11] The six teams to participate in the main round were Aizawl, Alakhpura,Eastern Sporting Union,Jeppiaar Institute, Pune City andRising Students' Club, and top four teams are decided to play the semi-finals after a singleround-robin stage. Aizawl and Pune City were the only clubs from both the I-League and the ISL to field their women teams in the competition and had achieved direct qualification in main round. Eastern Sporting Union defeated Rising Students' Club by 3–0 in the final and became the inaugural champion of IWL.[12]
Thefollowing season the AIFF extended their partnership with Hero MotoCorp and rebranded the league as the Hero IWL. The organisers also allowed the signing of foreign players in the main round but restricted to only two foreigners in matchday squad, while only one could be named in the starting eleven.[13] This season no other ISL or I-League club except Gokulam Kerala participated in the competition, therefore six teams were promoted from thepreliminary round to the main round. Gokulam Kerala became the first Indian club to sign a foreigner, as they included twoUgandan internationals –Fazila Ikwaput and Rita Nabbosa.[13][14] The only other club to sign foreigners wasSethu:Bangladeshi internationalsSabina Khatun andKrishna Rani Sarkar, andBritish midfielderTanvie Hans.[15][16] The preliminary round was played atKolhapur from 25 November to 8 December 2017 among thirteen teams, and the main round was held from 26 March to 14 April 2018 inShillong.[17] Last season's finalists met once again in the finals, but Rising Students' Club beat Eastern Sporting Union this time in thepenalties to win the league.[18] From2018–19 season, the qualification of teams was decided based on the results in respective state leagues, and the number of teams was also doubled to twelve. The format was also changed, and teams were divided into two groups to decide the top two from each group playing in the semi-finals. The season culminated with Sethu becoming the champion of IWL. Since 2019,AFC andFIFA jointly organised AFC Women's Club Championship, and India decided to participate in the second edition of the competition to be held in2021 AFC Women's Club Championship.[19] Therefore, the winner of the2019–20 season was decided to be the probable representative of India in the continental tournament.[20] At the final of the tournament, Gokulam Kerala became the champion of the season after remaining unbeaten throughout the tournament, thus became the first club to win the top-tier league of both men's and women's, and also the first Indian team to play in AFC Women's Club Championship.[20] In2021–22, the AIFF changed the format to a singleround-robin tournament and the team that would remain at the top of the table at the end, would be declared as the champions. Gokulam Kerala became the first club to defend their league title by finishing the season unbeaten, hence qualifying for the continental tournament for the second time in a row. In 2022–23, the league got expanded to 16 teams, with the top 8 of previous season to be eligible for direct qualification to the next season, irrespective of their results in the state leagues.[21]
The competition format had varied over the initial seasons, but mostly played as a knock-out tournament where four teams qualified for the single-legged semi-finals through the group stage played in singleround-robin format and eventually one would be declared as the champion by winning the final. Currently, the competition follows single round-robin league format of 12 rounds played at a single venue.[22] The winners of respectivestate leagues, along with previous season's top four teams, receive direct qualification to the league.[21][22] The interested clubs from the regions without any state tournament are to register for the IWL Qualifiers and earn a spot in the main round by winning the qualifier.[22]
A total of44 clubs have participated so far in the main round of IWL since its inception from 2016, up to the 2025–26 season.The following is a list of clubs that have played in theIWL at any time since its formation in 2016 to the current season.
In October 2016, it was announced thatHero MotoCorp would be the title sponsor for the league and hence the league would be known hasHero Indian Women's League.[23] The league is currently without a title sponsor, as Hero decided not to renew its sponsorship deal with Indian football after2022–23 season.[24]
The first four seasons of the league lackedTV broadcasting, and matches were live streamed on theYouTube channel and theFacebook page ofIndian Football.[25] Live updates of matches were also available on theTwitter profile of Indian Football. In 2022, the AIFF reached a deal withEurosport India to telecast the fifth edition of IWL, but only 30 matches out of total 66 matches were telecast.[26][27] For the 2023–24 season, the broadcast was done on Indian Football YouTube channel. Since the 2024–25 season, Shrachi Sports acquired the rights for the live streaming on SSEN digital app.[28]
Oinam Bembem Devi
