Shiva Thapa is a busy boy these days, a celebrity back home in Assam. This Sunday, the 19-year-old will be addressing local boxers as the chief guest of their tournament. Earlier, he attended a programme organised by the Assam Olympic Association before heading off to the Kaziranga National Park for some well-earned peace and quiet.
“I am entering Kaziranga so the network problem,” he tells you after the phone gets disconnected a couple of times.
Just last week, he won a gold medal at the Asian Boxing Championships in Amman, Jordan. This was the first international tournament for the Indian team after the 2012 london Olympics where the novice pugilist exited from the first round.
“It’s almost a year since the Olympics. I returned home, found out about my weakness and started working on them. One was the stamina part. Time and again, I would attack in the beginning of a round but lose steam in the end and that would be the reason for my loss. I have worked on it and it has helped,” Shiva adds.
So, how different was the Asian Championships with the new rules coming into placeIJ Under the new system, a total of five judges, like earlier, would award points to the boxers to the effect of 10-9 after every round but only three judges’ scores would be taken into account while declaring the results.
“It was quite different. Under the new system, I had to attack more and throw a flurry of punches. Now, one has to dominate the ring from the beginning. You can’t think of making a comeback in the third round. One has to win two of the three rounds. It’s all about impressing the judges now.
“My strategy was to dominate the first round of every match. It is not about punch and run now, it’s more of performing during the entire round. My quarterfinal was a tough bout against the boxer from Kazakhstan while the final was against the local boxer which made the conditions very tough. But my coach and the support staff motivated me saying it does not matter and I kept fighting,” he explains.
The next target is World Championships in October and for that the boxer would start training at the National Institute of Sports, Patiala, later this week. For now, though he is happy being home. “I just want to be here with my family.”
He is the youngest of the eight-member family — father, mother, brother and four sisters. His brother is a jawan in the Gorkha Regiment based in Shillong and a 2007 National Games silver medalist boxer while his sisters are helping his father with his small business in Guwahati. His mother is a housewife.
“Even when I was not an athlete, my father invested a lot thinking if the base is right, it will help my brother and me in a big way. He invested more than what he had and he was always there in all national championships I participated in. My family has been very supportive,” he signs off.