Like all mothers, Parveen Sultana was worried about her boxer-daughter Nikhat Zareen's future. For any middle-class family, getting their daughters married is of primary importance and Nikhat's parents were no different. In fact, Parveen disliked her daughter's keen interest in boxing and tried to convince her to give up the sport.
But for a free spirit like Nikhat, giving up her passion was not an option. But life in the lanes of Nizamabad, where she hails from, about 200 km from Hyderabad, was tough. There were no easy pickings and the rough, uncut diamond needed polish after Nikhat chose boxing over athletics just to prove a point - that she would one day become a world champion.
Punches flew thick and fast and the worry lines in her mother's face became more prominent. "I was really worried about her future, and which mother wouldn't? She was a tomboy, always playing with the boys and living life on her terms," Parveen told TOI on Friday.
"It was a major shock for me when she took up boxing. I thought she'd get bored of it soon, but she didn't. I tried my best to stop her from continuing because I was concerned that her face would get badly scarred by the punches and that would affect her marriage prospects."
Parveen still shudders every time a punch lands on Nikhat. "I started watching her matches from the Strandja Memorial tournament. Whenever she takes a punch, I feel it. It's always a painful experience for me," she said.
It was pain of a different kind for Nikhat's father Mohammad Jameel Ahmed. "I was frequently subjected to questions like how can a Muslim girl play a sport like boxing wearing shorts. While some asked me directly, others used to say things behind my back. All I knew was that I was encouraging a talented girl and luckily for me, she is my dear daughter," Jameel told TOI.
"I never expected Nikhat to be a world champion. My daughter faced a lot of obstacles on her road to success."
