GUWAHATI, Jan 22 - Boxing was where everyone expected Haryana to regroup and make up lost ground to Maharashtra in the medals tally at the Khelo India Youth Games. The sport had always been Haryana�s favoured hunting ground and over the years. The state, and its Bhiwani academies had, in particular, produced multiple male boxers who had represented India internationally.
In Guwahati though it was the girls who stole the limelight. In the U-17 category, Haryana contested nine of ten finals and won six golds in them. In fact, in one category, the 48kg light fly, they locked up the podium with three medals.
Satvir Kaur, a former boxer herself and a coach with the national team credits this to a grassroot system that promotes more inclusion than ever before in the state. Kaur was at the Khelo India Youth Games as a coach with the Haryana contingent and remembers how when she was boxing almost a decade back she was the only girl in a gym filled with boys.
Even if the situation isn�t too much different any more, coaches have figured how to use it to their advantage.
Navin Khokhar the coach of 51kg prodigy Anamika, believes it is this adversity that hardens the girls boxing in his gym. �When Anamika came to the academy, first she was short, stocky and overweight,� he said. �Additionally she was one of the first girls there, so obviously she was sparring with boys and learnt the hard stuff early.�
The experience isn�t isolated. 50kg flyweight gold medallist Rinku started boxing in 2012, by following her brother Mohit to a boxing academy in Charkhi Dadri. The Class XII student won bronze at the ASBC Asian Confederation Junior Boxing Championships in Dubai last year.
�When I started going there, I was the first girl there,� Rinku said.