Punam Raut has retired from all forms of international cricket, ending a career that took in 112 matches for India and one World Cup final at Lord’s. The 37-year-old announced the decision on Thursday, October 15, in a statement on Instagram, and it takes effect immediately. She had not played for India since 2021.

The numbers she leaves behind are those of a reliable top-order batter and one partnership that still has no equal. Cricbuzz lists 264 runs in four Tests, 2,299 in 73 ODIs and 719 in 35 T20Is, with four international hundreds: three in ODIs and one in Tests.

The announcement

Raut posted a long, plain statement thanking the people around her career. “After much thought and reflection, I have decided to retire from international cricket in all formats of the game,” she wrote, according to the PTI report carried by The New Indian Express. PTI described her as “out-of-favour” with the national team.

“Representing India has been the greatest honour of my life,” she wrote. “From the streets of Mumbai to wearing the Indian jersey, this journey has been nothing short of a blessing.” She added: “Every time I wore the India jersey, I did so with immense pride and gratitude.”

She thanked the BCCI, the Mumbai Cricket Association and Indian Railways, which she called “my second family”. She also singled out Mithali Raj. “It was a privilege to play under your captaincy for both India and Railways,” Raut wrote, in the statement as reproduced by ABP Live.

Her plans are about coaching. “My next innings is about giving back to the game that gave me everything,” she said, and ABP Live reports she is completing coaching certifications.

India Women international Punam Raut announces retirement from #cricket, as she looks to give back the game in different way.

She represented #INDW in 112 matches across #Test, #ODI and #T20I, scoring 3,283 runs, with her last international match way back in 2021.#IndiaCricket… pic.twitter.com/hRdgiz2yfq

— The CricHub (@thecrichub_live) October 15, 2026

Image/video: The CricHub (@thecrichub_live) on X

Totals differ by a run between outlets. India Today and Mint give 3,282 across formats, which is what the three format totals above add up to. The post above says 3,283.

A career in numbers

Raut made her ODI debut against the West Indies in March 2009 and played her first T20I against Pakistan that June, according to Mint. Her Test debut came against England in August 2014. Wikipedia’s player page shows her last T20I was against Pakistan in April 2014, so the shortest format was a small part of her story.

• Tests: 4 matches, 264 runs, average 44, one hundred (a best of 130 against South Africa in Mysuru, 2014).
• ODIs: 73 matches, 2,299 runs, average 34.83, three hundreds and 15 fifties.
• T20Is: 35 matches, 719 runs, strike rate 92.17, four fifties.
• Also: three ODI World Cups and four T20 World Cups, per ABP Live.

Her highest ODI score was an unbeaten 109, and her highest T20I score was 75, according to Wikipedia, which also lists 15 ODI catches and one ODI wicket. Her T20I average was 27.65, and 719 runs in 35 matches is a modest tally for the format. The ODIs and the Test are where her record sits.

She was born on 14 October 1989 in Mumbai, so the announcement came the day after her 37th birthday. At domestic level she played for Mumbai, then for Railways from the 2011/12 season to 2021/22, and Wikipedia lists her with Uttarakhand since 2022/23. She also played for the Trailblazers in the Women’s T20 Challenge from 2018 to 2020.

The 320 against Ireland

The partnership is the headline of her career. In May 2017, in a match against Ireland in a quadrangular series in South Africa, Raut and Deepti Sharma put on 320 for the first wicket. Deepti made 188. Raut made 109 off 116 balls with 11 fours before retiring hurt, as PTI reported.

The stand beat the previous women’s ODI record of 229, set by England’s Sarah Taylor and Caroline Atkins. It also went past the men’s ODI opening record of 286 by Sri Lanka’s Upul Tharanga and Sanath Jayasuriya, according to Wikipedia and Mint. Mint and ABP Live both call it a world record, and PTI describes it as the highest opening partnership in women’s ODIs.

Lord’s, July 2017

Two months later came the match most Indian fans associate with her. India reached the 2017 World Cup final in England and met the hosts at Lord’s, chasing 229. Raut made 86 off 115 balls, Mint reports, and added a stand with Harmanpreet Kaur, who made 51.

India were 191 for 4 when Raut was out. They lost their last six wickets for 28 runs and were bowled out for 219, losing by nine runs. Mint credits Anya Shrubsole with six wickets. Raut finished the tournament with 381 runs, a figure Cricbuzz and Mint both give.

Looking back this week, she called the tournament “one of the defining moments of my career”. “Although we fell just short of the trophy, that tournament transformed women’s cricket in India, inspired a generation of young girls, and changed the future of our game,” she said, per ABP Live.

The 2021 omission

Her form in 2021 makes the ending harder to explain. Mint reports that Raut played six ODIs that year and scored 295 runs at an average of 73.75, including an unbeaten hundred against South Africa. In May 2021 she was named in India’s squad for the one-off Test against England, according to Wikipedia.

Her last ODI, against England, was on 27 June 2021. The pink-ball Test against Australia at Carrara began on 30 September. That Test, not the ODI, was her last international match, according to Wikipedia and Sportstar, although some outlets name the June ODI. She did not play for India again, and Mint notes that more than five years passed before she announced her retirement.

She scored 36 in the first innings of that Test and was praised for walking after edging a ball, even though the umpire had given her not out, Cricbuzz notes.

Where the women’s team is now

Raut leaves at a time of change. Smriti Mandhana has taken over from Harmanpreet Kaur as full-time captain, and India Today reports that Mandhana opens her tenure in a T20I series against Zimbabwe. Mandhana described herself as “a player’s captain” to India Today. Shafali Verma is vice-captain, according to Sportstar.

Elsewhere in Indian cricket this week, our reports covered Shai Hope’s runs against India and Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s recall for New Zealand, and the earlier piece on Shreyas Iyer’s record hundred. For more, see our India cricket and cricket sections.

What comes next

Raut says her next step is giving back to the game, and she is working on coaching certifications. The first of India’s three T20Is against Zimbabwe, Mandhana’s first series as full-time captain, is scheduled for Friday, October 16, according to Sportstar’s streaming guide.

Sources: Cricbuzz, Mint, The New Indian Express (PTI), Sportstar, ABP Live (IANS), India Today, Wikipedia.

Photo: Robert Drummond / Wikimedia Commons, CC0