Nikhat Zareen, a recent sensation in world boxing, is an amateur boxer from India. She was in news with her win in the 2022 IBA Women's World Boxing Championship Finals against Jitpong Jutamas of Thailand in the flyweight 52kg category held in Istanbul. She became only the 5th Indian woman to achieve this milestone and joined the elite list along with Mary Kom.
Nikhat Zareen a girl from Telangana born on 14th June, 1996 is an professional amateur boxer. Amateur boxing is an event which is a variant of boxing played at the Olympics. It consists of four rounds of 2 minutes each with a minute break in between the rounds for women. She was introduced to boxing at the age of 15 by her father Mr. Mohammad Jameel Ahmed and later trained under Rao in Sports Authority of India in 2009. Within a year, she was awarded with the Golden best boxer in the Erode nationals in 2010. She had won Gold and silver in 2011 and 2014 world youth boxing championship respectively. She participated in many events and tournaments actively and had achieved many awards in her career.
2022 has been fruitful to her as she has already won two gold medals at international events. She won gold in Strandja Memorial Boxing Tournament by defeating three time champion Tetiana Klub by 4-1 in Bulgaria. Then she won the IBA Women's World Boxing Championship on 19th May 2022 at Istanbul in the 52kg category. She became only the second Indian after Mary Kom to win a gold medal outside India. Nikhat had a healthy and lively outing as she had hit some sharp punches to take upper hand in the game in the very first round. Hitting straight and clear punches were the key for her gold medal.
Nikhat Zareen had to overcome many odds to achieve this milestone from talks that boxing is not for women to shoulder injury to Islamophobia. She has crossed all the hurdles and is now a proud Indian who wishes to bring an Olympic medal home from the upcoming Olympics. She fought all the odds and is now an inspiration to many women across the country.
