In a state known
for its bias against the girl child, boxing is changing gender attitudes.
Avijit Ghosh travels to Bhiwani and Rohtak in Haryana to find out how medals
are made
They live
together in a rundown three-room house, just an Arnab Goswami shout away from
the famed Bhiwani Boxing Club (BBC). There are 10 of them now. One of them,
Guddan, is a daily wager’s daughter from western UP’s Baghpat district. Sonam
has lost her father, and her mother toils on her farm in Churu, Rajasthan. Most
others who come to train at the club are from similar disadvantaged
backgrounds.
It’s a tough
life for the teenaged girls. Rustling up Rs 10,000 every month for food and
boarding. Taking turns to cook after gruelling practice sessions. Battling
mosquitos at night because repellants are a luxury. Yet they are driven by a
fierce desire to outpunch every unkind cut life throws at them. For them,
boxing offers a ticket out of poverty and anonymity.
Most of them are
medal winners at interschool or university meets, state-level tournaments, even
national championships. And the gold-winning success of Ankushita Boro (64kg),
Jyoti Gulia (51kg), Shashi Chopra (57kg), Nitu (48kg) and Sakshi Chaudhary
(54kg) at the AIBA Youth World Boxing Championship in Guwahati last week has
only given wings to their stubborn dreams. All but Ankushita, who is from
Assam, are from Haryana. Nitu and Sakshi are, in fact, products of BBC.
In recent
decades, Haryana has been the ground zero of India’s Olympic challenge,
especially in wrestling and men’s boxing. The medals won by pugilist Vijender
and grapplers Yogeshwar Dutt and Sakshi Malik have inspired hundreds of boys
and girls in these parts. In women’s boxing, the lone Olympic medal has come
from Mary Kom of Manipur. However, the exploits of Arjuna Award winner Kavita
Chahal from Bhiwani are quite wellknown.
“What we are
witnessing now is more enthusiasm, more numbers. When I started in 2005, I was
the only girl boxer in Nimri village. Now there are at least 10,” says Chahal.
BBC coach Jagdish Singh, a Dronacharya award recipient whose wards include
Vijender and Akhil Kumar, has noticed a similar trend. “Five years ago, about
200 boys and 20 girls trained at BBC. Now, we have 90 boys and 28 girls. And
frankly, I expect more from these girls,” says Singh.
Boxing is
denting social stereotypes and changing gender attitudes in a state where khaps
and patriarchy still survive, if not thrive. Chahal says that even village
sarpanches now encourage girls to don the gloves. “My mother pays more
attention to my diet than that of my brother and he is preparing for NDA. She
says, you need it more. Tujhe boxing karni hai (You need to box). And
she never asks me to do domestic chores,” says Sakshi.
“But for boxing,
I would have been married off by now. Boxing has given me an opportunity to
achieve something, create my own identity,” says Pooja, 20, from Duleri
village. Her mother works as a labourer, her father is too ill to work. She
used to live in a rented house near the club. After winning a silver in an
international event in Serbia this year, she moved to the Sports Authority of
India’s National Boxing Academy in Rohtak.
Fathers too are
playing a vital role. Ritika Chohan, 14, a mason’s daughter and gold winner
(44-46kg) in the sub-junior state meet, says her father has struggled a lot for
her, much like Aamir Khan in Dangal. Ritika has three siblings. “Whatever my
father earns, he spends on me,” she says.
Manoj, Sakshi’s
father, owns five acres of land. He also worked as a contractor to supplement
his income. “I dropped my contract work to focus on her,” he says. Nitu’s
father Jai Bhagwan, is a clerk in Haryana’s vidhan sabha secretariat. “I was on
leave without pay from 2013 to 2016 to help Nitu,” he says.
Haryana now
desperately wants an Olympic medal winner in women’s boxing. Singh says it
won’t be easy. “There’s a huge difference in standard between youth and senior
levels. Success depends on how much they improve. But one thing is certain:
these girls are talented and dedicated. They respect us and follow what we
say,” he says.
Clearly, the
Beti Khelao (Let girls play) chorus is growing stronger in conservative
Haryana.
Rurki,
Rohtak:
When Jyoti Gulia
first stepped into the fast and fierce world of boxing at the tender age of 12,
she was torn about having to give up dancing. She was quite the hot stepper,
and won school dance competitions as easily as Salman Khan pummelled baddies on
screen. For months, she debated over the contending choices but boxing won.
Her first coach,
Sudhir Hooda, was also her motivator. “He used to tell me, think of Mary Kom.
If you train as hard and spend as many hours in the ring as her, you might
become like her,” recalls the
17-year-old.
Her family
wasn’t supportive initially. But a silver medal at the 2013 National School
Games made them see her potential. “When she later defeated a girl from Bhiwani
(the country’s boxing mecca), we were convinced,” says her brother Sonu.
Despite her
recent gold medal in the 51 kg category at the AIBA Youth World Boxing
Championship, money, or rather the lack of it, remains a problem. The Gulias
are marginal farmers who own a mere three acres of land.
So far, she has
received Rs 50,000 and Rs 1,800 as rewards from the government. Haryana state
animal husbandry minister Om Prakash Dhankar has promised a cow to each of the
state’s medal winners.
Jyoti might like
a little more support. She has earned a spot at the 2018 Summer Youth Olympics
in Buenos Aires, but her target is the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. An Olympic medal,
the Rurki girl has heard, can transform one’s station in life. She points at
her sparsely furnished home and says, “I just want to build a better home for
my family.”
My mother pays
more attention to my diet than my brothers and he is preparing for NDA. She
says you need it more. Tujhe boxing karni hai (You need to box). And she never
asks me to do domestic chores.
Source :Sunday Times- 3rd December,2017
