India’s Nikhat Zareen won the gold medal in the 52kg category at the Women’s World Boxing Championships with a victory over Thailand’s Jitpong Jutamas in the flyweight final in Istanbul, Turkey on Thursday. Nikhat thus became only the fifth Indian female boxer after Mary Kom, Sarita Devi, Jenny RL and Lekh KC to win a gold at the World Championships. 25-year-old Zareen is a former Junior Youth World Champion. Against his Thai rival in the final, Nikhat put up a great fight and won the gold medal. The judges scored 30-27, 29-28, 29-28, 30-27, 29-28 for the Indian side.
Zareen was in excellent form as she used her technical prowess and covered the court well enough to take down her nimble-footed opponent. Nikhat managed to impress all the judges in the first round as he hit far more punches than the Thai boxer. The second round was tight and Jitpong won it 3–2. Needing to bring in just one judge for his side in the final round, Nikhat went in and slammed the door on his opponent and eventually recorded a 5-0 unanimous decision in his favour.
The Nizamabad (Telangana)-born boxer became the only fifth Indian woman after six-time champion Mary Kom (2002, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010 and 2018), Sarita Devi (2006), to win a gold medal at the World Boxing Championships. , Jenny RL (2006) and Article Casey (2006).
It was also India’s first gold medal after the legendary boxer Mary Kom won in 2018.
Nikhat started well and hit some sharp punches and took the lead in the opening three minutes against the confident Zutamas, who had come into the match after beating three-time World Championships medalist Zaina Shcherbekova of Kazakhstan.
The 25-year-old Indian took full advantage of his long reach and continued his dominance against the Thai boxer whom he defeated in the 2019 Thailand Open semi-final – the only meeting between the two, which earned him a silver medal.
However, Jutamas tried to fight back with a counter-attacking performance in the second round, but barely managed to cause any trouble for the fast-moving Nikhat, who seemed to be in complete control.
Hitting straight and clear punches, strength proved to be a key factor as Nikhat threw carefully in the air in the final round and continued to attack before snatching the gold quite comfortably.
“Winning a medal in the world is always a dream and Nikhat achieving it so quickly is highly commendable. We, at BFI, are proud that our boxers have not only made us all proud, but each and every one of their boxing journeys has made us proud. Inspirational for the generations to come,” BFI President Ajay Singh said.
“On behalf of the Boxing Federation of India, I congratulate Nikhat and bronze medalists Parveen and Manisha as well as the coaches and support staff for this achievement. Eight of our boxers qualified for the quarter-finals which is the joint most Was and shows the strength of Indian boxing,” he said.
Manisha (57kg) and Parveen (63kg) signed on with bronze medals after reaching the semi-finals, with the Indian contingent ending their campaign in the world’s biggest boxing event with three medals, taking a record 310 from 73 nations. An exciting competition was witnessed in the presence of the boxers. And also marked the 20th anniversary of the Women’s World Championships.
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Of the 12 participating Indian boxers, eight made it to the quarterfinals at this year’s tournament—the joint highest with Turkey.
With three medals in Istanbul, India’s overall medal tally has gone up to 39, comprising 10 gold, eight silver and 21 bronze, in 12 editions of the prestigious event – the third highest after Russia (60) and China (50). Is. ,
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