Nikhat Zareen is a two-time world champion and one of only two Indian women to have won more than one world boxing title. Her golds in Istanbul in 2022 and New Delhi in 2023, either side of a Commonwealth Games title in Birmingham, came after years spent trying to break through in the same weight range as Mary Kom.
Name: Nikhat Zareen | Born: 14 June 1996, Nizamabad, Telangana | Sport: Boxing | Event: Women’s light flyweight (50 kg) and flyweight (51-52 kg)
Nizamabad and the first coaches
Nikhat was born in Nizamabad, then part of Andhra Pradesh and now in Telangana, to Mohammad Jameel Ahmed and Parveen Sultana. She went to Nirmala Hrudaya Girls High School in the town and later studied for a Bachelor of Arts at AV College in Hyderabad.
Her father took her into boxing on the advice of coach Omkar Yadav, who worked with her for a year at LB Stadium in Hyderabad. In 2009 she joined the Sports Authority of India centre in Visakhapatnam, where she trained under the Dronacharya awardee I. V. Rao. The progress was quick. In 2010 she was named the best boxer at the national championships in Erode.
A junior world title in Antalya
In 2011 she won the flyweight title at the AIBA Women’s Junior and Youth World Championships in Antalya, Turkey, beating the home boxer Ulku Demir 27-16 in the final. She later added a silver medal at the Youth World Championships in Bulgaria, and in 2014 she won gold at the Nations Cup in Novi Sad, Serbia.
Her senior career moved more slowly. In the flyweight and light flyweight classes she was competing for a national place with Mary Kom, already a multiple world champion and an Olympic medallist. In 2019 she won bronze at the Asian Championships in Bangkok and her first Strandja Memorial gold in Sofia. In December that year she met Mary Kom in a trial bout for a place at the Olympic qualifiers, and Mary Kom won it.
Istanbul 2022
The next Olympic cycle belonged to Nikhat. Early in 2022 she won the Strandja Memorial again, beating Ukraine’s Tetiana Kob 4-1 in the 51 kg final after a semi-final win over Turkey’s Buse Naz Çakıroğlu.
At the World Championships in Istanbul in May 2022 she went through the 52 kg draw and beat Thailand’s Jitpong Jutamas 5-0 in the final on 19 May. She became the fifth Indian woman to win a world title, after Mary Kom, Sarita Devi, Jenny R. L. and Lekha K. C.
Commonwealth gold in Birmingham
Paris 2024 had no 52 kg class, so she moved down to 50 kg, an Olympic weight, and boxed there at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham. On 7 August 2022 she beat Northern Ireland’s Carly McNaul 5-0 in the light flyweight final to win gold at her first Games.
A second world title at home
The 2023 World Championships were held in New Delhi, and Nikhat boxed at 50 kg. On 26 March 2023 she beat Vietnam’s Nguyen Thi Tam 5-0 in the final to retain her world title in a different weight class. It made her the second Indian woman, after Mary Kom, to win more than one world championship.
Later that year she won bronze at the Asian Games in Hangzhou. Reaching the semi-final was enough to secure India a quota place at 50 kg for the Paris Olympics.
Paris 2024 and after
Nikhat went to Paris unseeded. She beat Germany’s Maxi Carina Klötzer 5-0 in her opening bout, then met China’s Wu Yu, the top-ranked boxer in the division, and lost 5-0. It was a hard draw and an early exit from her first Olympics.
At the 2025 World Championships in Liverpool she reached the quarter-finals before losing 5-0 to Buse Naz Çakıroğlu, the opponent she had beaten on the way to her 2022 Strandja title. She returned to winning form later that year with flyweight gold at the World Boxing Cup Finals in India.
Work and support
Nikhat was appointed a staff officer with the Bank of India in Hyderabad in 2021, and in September 2024 she joined the Telangana Police as a deputy superintendent. She has been part of the government’s Target Olympic Podium Scheme. Nizamabad named her its official ambassador in 2014, years before her senior world titles.
Career record and honours
- World Championships: gold 2022 Istanbul (52 kg), gold 2023 New Delhi (50 kg)
- Commonwealth Games: gold 2022 Birmingham (50 kg)
- Asian Games: bronze 2022 Hangzhou (50 kg)
- Asian Championships: bronze 2019 Bangkok
- Strandja Memorial: gold 2019 and 2022
- AIBA Women’s Junior and Youth World Championships: gold 2011 Antalya
- Olympic Games: Paris 2024 (50 kg), lost in the round of 16
- World Boxing Cup Finals: gold 2025 (flyweight)
- Arjuna Award: 2022