Arjuna Awardee
Lovlina Borgohain
Young boxer Lovlina brought laurels to the state of Assam by being awarded the Arjuna award in the year 2020 by the President of India Ram Nath Kovind for her outstanding performance in boxing. She is the first Assamese woman to qualify for the Olympics, and is the state’s second boxer to represent the country after Shiva Thapa. She is the sixth individual from Assam to win the Arjuna Award in 2020.
Early Life
Lovlina hails from the Bara Mukhia village in the Golaghat district of Assam. She has two elder sisters – Licha and Lima. Coming from a middle-class family with a low income, her family faced financial struggles during the earlier years. However, her father always supported her and both of her sister’s dreams. All three of them were originally drawn to kickboxing at first, but later both of her elder sisters decided to discontinue their kickboxing while Lovlina switched to boxing.
Her Journey and Wins
Lovina’s boxing skills firstly drew the attention of Padum Boro at the Sports Authority of India (SAI) trials at her primary school, Padum later started coaching her in 2012. Later she was coached by India’s chief Women’s boxing coach Shiv Singh.
She represented India in the AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championship (2018) and won the bronze medal in the Welterweight category (69kg). Again she got selected for her second Women’s World Boxing Championships (2019) in Russia, was defeated by China’s Yang Liu in the 69kg category, and had to settle for a bronze medal.
She competed in the 1st India Open International Boxing Tournament in New Delhi and the 2nd India Open International Boxing Tournament in Guwahati, winning both gold and silver medals. She came in third place in the 69 kg Welterweight division.
Lovlina earned an Olympic berth in the 69 kg division by defeating Maftunakhon Melieva of Uzbekistan 5-0 in the 2020 Asia & Oceania Boxing Olympic Qualification Tournament in March 2020. As a result, she became the first Assamese athlete to qualify for the Olympics.
She was defeated by Gu Hong of China, the 2018 AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships silver medalist, in a unanimous 5-0 decision, and finished with a bronze medal at the Asian Olympic Qualifiers.
Current Position
Women’s 69 kg boxer Lovlina was supposed to start her training in Italy but missed the chance as she was tested positive for COVID-19. After recovering from her illness she is getting back in form.