Two friends put their gloves on
FIGHTERS Close friends off the ring, Lovlina Borgohain and Jamuna Boro have risen together to the top of Indian boxing
NEWDELHI: It’s been seven years, but Lovlina Borgohain still remembers that day with difficulty; her eyes tear up and her voice cracks. It was 2012, the sub-junior nationals in Kolkata, and Borgohain needed a redcorner kit that she did not have. It had just been a few months since she had first stepped out of her vil l age Baramukhia i n Assam’s Golaghat district to try to become a boxer.
“I asked one of the girls who had lost her bout if I could borrow hers. She agreed but with a condition that I give her my mobile,” she recalls.
That phone was her lifeline; she was still coming to terms with her new life away from home, and it was the only way to remain in touch her family. Yet, boxing came first. She gave her phone away. The girl did not keep her word. Borgohain did not get the kit.
“You know some incidents in life leave a mark. It still rankles whenever I think of it. Today I have so many boxing dresses and she took away my mobile which was my lifeline then,” Borgohain, now 22, says.
Yet, choosing her sport over her phone is not something she regrets. Borgohain is now one of the country’s finest amateurs, the top fighter in the 69kg category, and is widely expected to qualify for the Olympics.
After all, she has now reached the semi-finals and won the bronze in that weight class two years in a row—2018 and 2019—at the boxing world championships.
But back then, when she was fifteen, and both the sport and the world outside her home was new to her, she forged a deep friendship with another boxer of her age, Jamuna Boro, at the Sports Authority of India’s (SAI) centre in Guwahati.
Together, they were indomitable trouble makers—sneaking out of training for pizza, breaking late night curfews, pulling pranks on friends, and constantly finding themselves at odds with the warden.
“But who cared?” Borgohain and Boro break into laughter recalling their training days in Guwahati. “Once we were having a late night party and the warden came, and all the other girls ran away and only we two were caught,” Borgohain says.
“We were given a warning and our coaches were informed. We s t i l l organised parti e s secretly.”
That friendship has remained strong, and while the heady days of teenage rebellion are over, the two boxers continue to do what counts: win fights and medals. Boro, who competes in the non-olympic 54kg category, also won a bronze, on her debut, at the 2019 Boxing World Championships.
“We have been winning medals together since our sub junior d a y s . We h a v e travelled together, stayed together and won medals in national and international competition,” says Boro.
“We are feeling very good that we went together for our first major international and r e t u r n e d wi t h medal s . It brought back so many memories,” says Boro.
Yet, the two have also had to recalibrate their relationship. When Boro first came to the national camp this year in February, the first thought that came to her mind was being able to reconnect with Borgohain who had already cemented her place in the national squad two years back. They soon realised that their friendship was taking a toll on their training.
“We love to spend time with each other and once we start chatting we just can’t stop,” says Borgohain.
“We start making plans for shopping, eating out. It was affecting our training, so we decided to maintain a distance and focus on our preparations. It has helped.”
Both boxers had a tough journey to boxing. Boro lost her father early and her mother took care of her three children by s e l l i ng vegetables. The youngest of three sisters, Boro first started training in wushu in a centre in the tea-estate town of Dhekiajuli, a few kilometres away from her village Belsiri. For three years, Boro stuck to wushu and even represented her state, before switching to boxing in 2009 after a SAI talent hunt got her admission to the centre in Guwahati.
“First I was rejected because I was tiny but then I insisted and they took me to Guwahati where I threw punches and was good in sparring. So I was selected. I found boxing much easier,” says Boro.
“My mother is not educated and never travelled outside. But she would travel three and half hours by bus or train and come to meet me in Guwahati every 15 days. She would wash all my clothes. Now it’s my time to take care of her,” says Boro, who is now an employee of Assam Rifles.
If Boro was initially rejected because she was small, Borgohain was picked for boxing because of her height.
Borgohain got her start in a different combat sport—muay Thai—too, before she was spotted at a school boxing trial.
“They picked me because I was t al l and I was di r e c t l y selected to represent Assam in sub junior nationals in 2012 because there are not many boxers to represent the state at that level,” she says. With bare minimum training, Borgohain grabbed a gold.
Her coaches worked with her Muay Thai experience.
“In Thai boxing you have 1-2 punches (a combination of two punches),” laughs Borgohain. “I was told by the coaches, just don’t use the kick, and throw as many punches as possi bl e (instead of t h r o wi n g t wo punches at a time). I did just that.”
The constant struggles in t he i r p e r s o nal l i v e s have cemented in both Boro and Borgohain a steely determination to prove themselves.
“We are three sisters and like in Indian villages there was this constant talk that there is no son,” Borgohain says. “Our father had to stay away from home for months due to work. My mother used to say that we have to do something to change our situation and that stayed with me. So when I got a chance i n boxing, I was very motivated.”
In 2017, she was selected for the Asian Championships and Borgohain responded with a bronze medal. Next up was the youth world championships in Guwahati where she impressed India’s new national coach Rafaelle Bergamasco.
Before the Asian Championships she started training with Sandhya Gurung, who is assistant coach with the women’s team. Gurung taught her to make use of her height and fight from range.
“When you are at the youth level there is less focus on style and technique. You just use your body power but boxing is technical,” Borgohain says.
I f Borgohain makes i t t o Tokyo 2020, she will not have Boro at her side. They will keep in touch over the phone. Borgohain does not need to give hers away anymore.