Hyderabadi inventor makes India's first portable badminton court a reality

Now, six years and much research later, the 26-year-old has built India’s first portable badminton court that could make up for the lack of sports infrastructure in the country.

While setting up isn’t as quick as his “dream”, one can pack the badminton arena in a bundle, unfold and inflate it into a dome — in six hours! All you need is a level surface.

Abhilash is trying to bring down the installation time to five minutes.

He also hopes his invention helps badminton — a sport in which he played national-level matches, until a knee injury ended his career.

So, yes, because of his badminton know-how, his court meets standards and dimensions laid down by the Badminton World Federation and can even host tournaments.

The hemispherical arena, made of rain-proof military canvas, has a radius of 9 meter, and is spacious enough to accommodate audience and a few indoor games like table tennis and carrom.

The structure also spent a long time on the drawing board. Abhilash met 200 architects in India, the US and across Europe but they rejected the idea saying “it was against the law of physics”.

“They said all structures need supporting pillars. But I wanted to have a portable court — without big pillars. My search ended with Hyderabad architect Sanjeev Jain. Later my juniors from IIIT-H, Abhimanyu Pamulapati, Himanshu Singh and Sai Kiran Gorthi, joined this venture, that we now call Khelio.”

During his search, Abhilash quit two well-paying jobs at Google in Hyderabad and Facebook, in the US. And now that his ‘court from the suitcase’ dream has come true, he’s waiting for social impact.

“I’m renting the dome out to schools and firms in the city. If space is the issue, this portable arena can help.”