For decades, Indians have known the North-East as the hotbed of insurgency. Now they have started knowing it for boxing, courtesy Mary Kom and others.
The general feeling here is that boxing will help people, ignorant of the North-East, to know and understand the region better. The North-East has produced a number of champion boxers starting from Asian Games gold medalist Dingko Singh to Mary, Sarita, Devendro, Shiva and several others. Mary bagged a gold in the ongoing Incheon Asian Games.
The youngest Indian boxer ever to qualify for an Olympic (2012, London), Shiva, now 21, is also the youngest Indian to win a gold medal at the Asian Confederation Boxing Championship at Amman, Jordan last year. Sarita is a former world champion in the lightweight category while Devendro won a silver at the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
That many in the mainstream did not know about Mary until they had seen the biopic "Mary Kom" is a testimony to the gulf that exists between the region and rest of the country. Umang Kumar, who directed the biopic, had admitted that he did not know much about the Olympic bronze medalist before making the film.
Boxing is now acting as a tool to help bridge that gap. Had it not been so, the social media would not have been abuzz with protests, mostly from people other than from North-East, over Sarita's case who bowed out of the semis following a controversial decision of the judges.
"Yes, I agree that an integration process has begun. But it is just the other way round – the rest of country is, in fact, coming closer to the North-East," said L Manglem, former secretary of Manipur Olympic Association.
"Surely, the rest of the country will now start taking note of us. Our achievements in the sporting arena, especially boxing, will make them change their mindset…We are proud to be Indians. Many do not know that there is an India beyond Bengal," he said.
Manglem said had Sarita hailed from the mainstream there would by now have been a hue and cry in the political circles over her case. "Many got to know about Mary only after she had won her fifth world championship title. This is very unfortunate. Hopefully, things will change. It felt good to see many in the mainstream expressing solidarity with Sarita," a Manipuri writer, who did not wish to be named, said.
"Boxing is not a new phenomenon. So, it is not the game but Mary's medals and the persona that is helping the process of integration. Rest of the country is visibly inching closer to the North-East through boxing and Manipur," said Nagaland-based Deep Kumar, chairman (North-East) of Taekwon-do Board of India.
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