From making headlines back in 2011 when she became a junior world champion to winning the title of world champion eleven years later and then again clinching gold in CWG 2022 Birmingham, her journey of becoming a ‘Golden Best Boxer’ hasn’t been one without challenges.
Zareen was introduced to boxing by her father, Mohammad Jameel Ahmed, and she trained under him for a year. Nikhat was inducted into the Sports Authority of India in Vishakhapatnam to train under Dronacharya awardee, IV Rao in 2009. A year later, she was being declared the ‘golden best boxer’ at the Erode Nationals in 2010.
Her achievements are worth mentioning time and again. She won gold medal at the 2011 AIBA Women’s Youth & Junior World Boxing Championships held in Antalya. Adding on Zareen won gold medal at the 2022 IBA Women’s World Boxing Championships, and became the fifth Indian woman to win a gold medal at the IBA World Boxing Championships. Zareen works as a general banking officer at Bank of India since June 2021. She won gold medal at the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.
On being asked about her bonding with the legendary pugilist Mary Kom during the launch conference of the Delhi Half Marathon, Nikhat said, “The hunger to win medals for the country is something that is similar in both of us. She has been my role model, my idol, and my inspiration all throughout. I always look up to her and I always like to become like her but I want to be known as Nikhat Zareen and not as a challenger to Mary Kom.
“People used to call me the next Mary Kom but after winning world championships, people have started recognizing me, so it feels nice and I hope that I keep winning medals for my country in the future also,” she said when asked about her constant comparison with Mary.
Nikhat who has expressed her desire to be an inspiration for Muslim girls reiterated the same and said, “I belong to a conservative family (society), they don’t allow girls to come out and achieve their dreams, but my father, he himself was an athlete. He supported me a lot. So, I want other girls from my community also to come forward, they should also get a chance to achieve their goals and make their family and country proud just like I did.”
Not long ago, in one of her post’s captions on her social media handle, she quoted “Take Pride when they say that you punch like a girl”. Explaining her vision, she said, “As I said that people have a mentality that girls are weak, women are not strong enough to take a sport like boxing, that’s why I wanted and still want to tell these kinds of people that girls can also be best boxers in the world.”
She opened up about her struggles and hurdles which came in her way and said, “The biggest challenge for me was that I came from an orthodox family, a conservative background, and then in 2017, I had to face the biggest jolt of my career till date, my shoulder injury which kept me away from boxing for about a year. So, it was very difficult to mentally and physically come out of that phase and make a comeback again and win medals for my country.”
Meanwhile, during the launch event of the Delhi Half Marathon, it was announced that the prestigious event will be held on Sunday, 16th October 2022. Apart from Nikhat, several other sporting icons graced the function including Khel Ratna awardee and AFI’s first woman vice-president Anju Bobby George, 2022 Commonwealth Games 3000 m steeplechase silver medallist & half marathon National Record Holder Avinash Sable, Olympian & former India hockey captain Sardara Singh, 2022 Commonwealth Games triple jump winner Eldhose Paul and para high jumper and Tokyo Paralympics Bronze Medallist Sharad Kumar, former India International cricket player Suresh Raina and Indian professional boxer Vijender Singh.
