Boxing may not be one of India's biggest strengths going into next month's Rio Olympics. Nonetheless, the sport has provided good outcomes in terms of medals in the recent Olympics.
India has won only two medals in the history of boxing in the summer extravaganza and both came in the last two Games.
Vijender Singh was the first to script the boxing history.
The Haryana boxer defeated Carlos Gongora of Ecuador 9-4 in the quarterfinals of the 2008 Beijing Olympics which guaranteed him a bronze medal.
The next Olympic medal winner for the country was the celebrated female boxer — Mary Kom.
The five-time World Amateur Boxing champion was the only Indian woman boxer to qualify for the 2012 Games and won the bronze medal in the flyweight (51 kg) category.
However, both the boxers will not be available to compete at this year's Olympics. Vijender bid adieu to his amateur career by turning professional last year, which ruled him out of contention for the Rio Games, whereas, Mary simply failed to make the cut for the Rio Games.
In their absence, the three boxers, Vikas Krishan, Shiva Thapa and Manoj Kumar, who have qualified this time around in that discipline will look to make it a hat-trick of medals for India at Olympics when the Games kick start next month at Rio.
Among the three, Shiva looks to be the leading medal prospect for the country.
Shiva, who competes at the 56kg weight category, became youngest Indian boxer ever to participate in the Olympics when he qualified for the 2012 london Olympics after securing his qualification through the 2012 Asian Olympic Qualifiers in Astana, Kazakhstan.
However, his dream debut at the Olympics failed to leave a mark as he was eliminated in the first round by Mexico's Oscar Valdez Fierro.
The 2010 summer youth Olympics silver medallist did not let that disappoint get the better of him as he built on from his promises to become the first boxer to qualify for the Rio Games. Ranked at No 3 in the bantamweight category in the AIBA Men's world ranking, 22-year-old boxer is one to look out for at Rio.
Vikas is another boxer who has the experience of competing at Olympics previously. He also board the plane alongside Shiva for london in 2012. But, just like his colleague, Vikas too had to take an early flight back home. He was upset in the first round in controversial circumstances after losing to American Errol Spence. The 24-year-old will certainly look to make things right this time with an extended run in the tournament.
This time it wasn't easy for him to qualify the Games straight away like he did last time. For london the boxer from Bhiwani district in Haryana, qualified for the Olympics some eight months before the tournament.
But this time around though he had to book a Rio ticket at the death after grabbing a bronze-medal at the International Boxing Association's (AIBA) World Qualifying Tournament at Baku in the middleweight category.
Manoj Kumar will also hope to have good outing in next month's Olympics. The 2010 Commonwealth Games Gold medallist in the light welterweight division defeated Tajikistan's Rakhimov Shavkatdzhon in the quarterfinals of the AIBA World Qualifying Tournament to secure an Olympic ticket.
The former Asian Championships bronze-medallist will look to better his quarterfinal finish in the 2012 london Games.
However, the country's participation in the sport in Olympics has gone down drastically from last time. From eight participants in the 2012 Games, only three have qualified this time around for Olympics, thanks to the disarray in Indian boxing federation.
In 2012, the Indian Amateur Boxing Federation (IABF) was terminated for manipulation in elections. The body that took shape later — Boxing India — could not run the show for even a year and had to be dissolved after a rebellion by the state units. Ever since, an ad-hoc committee appointed by the International Boxing Association (AIBA) is administering the sport and elections are being planned tentatively in September to put together a new body — the Boxing Federation of India.