Made me uneasy: Keyaa Banerji on fake AI content, fame during her powerlifting rise
For most athletes, a breakthrough performance is supposed to be the beginning of a celebration. For Keyaa Banerji, it also marked the beginning of an entirely unexpected challenge.
The 21-year-old powerlifter became an overnight sensation after her extraordinary 140kg deadlift in the Junior Women’s 47kg category in Sun City, South Africa. The lift, more than three times her competition bodyweight of 45.70kg, earned Banerji a silver medal and brought unprecedented attention to her journey in the sport.
Alongside her standout deadlift, she recorded a 90kg squat and a 50kg bench press, securing a combined total of 280kg to finish fifth overall in her category.
NAVIGATING UNWANTED FAME
However, the global spotlight came with severe consequences she had never anticipated. Beyond the sudden loss of privacy, Banerji faced harassment online, account impersonation, and disturbing invasive conversations surrounding her ethnicity, ancestry, and caste. Most distressingly, thousands of AI-generated images of her were morphed and edited without her consent, flooding her feed and those of her close circle.
The ordeal was exacerbated when Instagram suspended her original private account, which had just 300 followers and where she rarely posted pictures. To reclaim her narrative, prevent further suspensions, and ensure she was not silenced, she made the difficult decision to set up a new public profile.
“I was always a very private person and did my sport purely for a sense of personal fulfilment,” Banerji told Sports Today. “When I saw that clip of me going around after IPF Worlds, it initially made me uneasy because I had a private Instagram account and didn’t have much of a social media presence. Initially, I just wanted to share this accomplishment with my close friends and family. It still makes me uneasy to have a public account all of a sudden, but I’d rather take shaky steps towards standing up for myself and having some kind of say in a story about me than reading different versions of it everyday.”
6She further clarified on her social media that she has no intentions of becoming a content creator or profiting from her new page, using it strictly to establish her authentic voice and counter ongoing abuse.
REFOCUSING ON SPORT
In the interview, Banerji made it clear that she wants the focus to remain where it truly belongs: on her sport, her personal growth, and the broader challenges facing Indian powerlifting.
“I have clarified this earlier as well, and I wouldn’t want to get into it too much,” Banerji said. “Now that I’m getting opportunities to speak on such platforms, I would like to keep the conversation related to my sport.”
For Banerji, the growing media attention offers a vital opportunity to bring greater visibility to a discipline that remains on the fringes of India’s sporting landscape. Her achievements on the international stage have established her as one of the country’s most promising young athletes.
Off the platform, her journey is equally multifaceted. Banerji recently graduated from Ashoka University with a BSc in Psychology and is currently considering pursuing an MBA. For now, however, her primary focus remains on building upon her landmark international campaign and continuing her upward trajectory in powerlifting.
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