GOLD COAST, AUSTRALIA: Five-time world amateur champion and Olympic Bronze medallist MC Mary Kom further burnished her Indian boxing queen status by winning Gold in what was her debut Commonwealth Games, also perhaps her last, here Saturday.
The 35-year-old mother of three and Rajya Sabha MP (Upper House of Parliament) beat Kristina O’Hara of Northern Ireland with a dominating 5-0 unanimous decision in the Gold medal match in the 45-48 kilogram division at the Commonwealth Games.
Mary Kom thus became the first Indian woman boxer to claim a Commonwealth Games Gold.
Kom won a Bronze medal in the 51-kilogram division at the London Olympics in 2012, but failed to qualify for the Rio de Janeiro Games in 2016.
She competed in the Asian championships last November in the first stage of a comeback and won Gold.
After victory, Kom said she may give the Olympics another shot — “if I am fit enough, I will go for Tokyo 2020”.
“I am so glad to have made history again, it is a special feeling to win something that is a milestone medal. I am just so glad,” a beaming Mary Kom said after the victory. “This medal and each one of my medals is special to me because I have worked equally hard for them. And I will continue to do so till the time my body is fit,” she added.
Enduring multiple breaks and distractions in her career that would have stopped most athletes in their tracks, the 35-year old has continued to lead from the front. “I don’t know how I pull it off sometimes,” she had said, after her Asian Championship Gold last November. Mary had twice put her career on hold in 2008 and 2012 after the birth of her children.
Overall, it was great day for Indian boxing with Gaurav Solanki (52 kg) and Vikas Krishan (75 kg) also taking home Gold medals while Amit Panghal (46-49 kg) and Manish Kaushik (60 kg) claimed Silver.
