Daughter of an Autorickshaw driver, Minakshi cruising to the top of the boxing world

Srikrishan Hooda’s workday routine has been the same for the better part of three decades. Between 8:30 AM and 6 PM, he will be driving around the city of Rohtak in Haryana searching for passengers he can ferry in his autorickshaw. He might come back a bit later if he gets a late ride, but for the most part, this schedule is set in stone.

On Saturday, though, he dropped off his final passenger of the day by 4:00 PM. He then headed to Rurki, a village about 20 kilometres north of Rohtak, where at the boxing academy located in the local sports stadium, a laptop had been hooked up to live stream a bout of the Boxing World Championships featuring a boxer from this very centre.

There’s no way Srikrishan was going to miss this bout. It’s a choice he’s glad he made, for he gets to see his daughter Minakshi win the most important bout of her career. Competing for India in the women’s 48kg category, the 24-year-old beat two-time Asian bronze medallist Lutsaikhany Altensetseg of Mongolia to book her place in the final of the World Championships. She will take on Nazym Kzaibay of Kazakhstan in the final on Sunday evening.

She’s already assured of a silver, but Minakshi’s isn’t done. “I don’t want anything other than gold,” she tells Sportstar from Liverpool after her bout.

Even this is something Srikrishan can hardly imagine. “I sometimes can’t believe Minakshi’s gone so far,” he says.

Indeed Minakshi’s journey from the village of Rurki, to potentially the highest step on the podium in Liverpool is an unlikely one.

Fortuitous beginnings

Minakshi is the youngest of four siblings – two other sisters and one brother. None of them played sports, nor did anyone in their family. Sports came to Rurki fortuitously through self-taught coach Vijay Hooda, who started a boxing academy in 2013 primarily as a way to keep kids out of trouble.

As she saw other girls go and train in the academy, in 2018, Minakshi too decided she would go. While she was keen, her father initially was against the idea.

“I didn’t have anything against her boxing. But I didn’t think I could afford the cost of raising a sportsperson. I could barely afford the roof over our heads. I didn’t have land or a job. I didn’t even own my auto rickshaw but instead rented it out. How would I be able to afford a sports person’s specialised diet or her equipment?” Shrikrishan recalled.

It was coach Vijay Hooda who convinced Shrikrishan to let his daughter play.

“At that time, I was trying to get as many children to join the academy as possible. But I also thought there was something special about Minakshi. She was tall for her age, but also much lighter than girls of her height. That’s the physical quality you want in a boxer. I told her father that I’d support her expenses as much as possible, but he needed to let her train. I even got some of her classmates who were training at the academy to convince her father,” he says.

Vijay didn’t back down from his promise. “Apart from my parents, he is the most important person in my life,” says Minakshi. “ Shuru me bohot problem thi diet aur kit ka. (At the start, there were a lot of problems getting the right diet and equipment). Vijay  sir supported me a lot in the early part of my career. He paid for milk and fruit, and also with my kit,” she says.

Once he saw his daughter put her heart and mind to the sport, Shrikrishan too supported her as much as he could. “I’d drive her in my autorickshaw to the academy, and sometimes when she would train at Rohtak’s Rajiv Gandhi stadium, I’d drive her there in my autorickshaw too. It was very hard, of course, to balance the budget, but we managed. Sometimes, when Minakshi had to go to compete at the state championships or the national championships, then I’d fall short of funds, but I’d borrow money and manage,” he says.

For her part, Minakshi performed where she had to. In 2019, she won gold at the Youth Nationals in Rudrapur. Although that result inexplicably never earned her the right to compete at the Youth World Championships, she was improving steadily.

Career rise

In 2021, she beat Youth World Champion Jyoti Gulia (incidentally from the same academy in Rurki) en route to the silver medal at the Senior National Championships in Hisar. Although she lost the final to Nikhat Zareen, the 2-3 scoreline was the furthest the future two-time World Champion would be pushed in a domestic competition.

That competition was important in more ways than one, for on the basis of her medal there, Minakshi got a sports quota government job with Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP).

“That job took care of a lot of the financial trouble in our family. I even was able to get my father his own auto rickshaw so he didn’t have to rent one anymore,” she says.

Able to focus on her game, Minakshi’s only gotten better. She won gold at the senior nationals in 2023 and 2024 before really hitting her peak in 2025. This year, she beat former World Champion Neetu Ghanghas to win gold at the national championships and then beat the same opponent once again at the national selection trials.

According to National Chief Coach D Chandralal, Minakshi’s chief strengths are her height – at 5’4” she is one of the tallest fighters in the women’s 48kg division – which gives her a reach advantage – and her straight punches.

“She has very good technique when it comes to straight punching. She is able to keep her distance against shorter opponents very well,” he says.

Big results

Results have been coming through in international competitions now as well. Competing at the World Boxing World Cup in Kazakhstan, Minakshi beat four Olympians before losing to Paris Olympics bronze medallist, Nazym, in the women’s 51kg category.

That loss is one that doesn’t sit well with those around her. “Minakshi was competing against a home boxer, and although she boxed very well, I think we were unlucky that the decision went against her,” says Dr. Chandralal.

At the final World Championships, Minakshi will have the opportunity to avenge that defeat in the most satisfying way possible. She’s not looking at revenge or even at what the prospect of beating an Olympic medallist might mean for her own career, but just at accomplishing what she set out to do when she travelled to England for the World Championships. “ Filhal world champion banna hai (for now I want to become the world champion),” she says.

On Sunday, her father plans to take time off from driving his autorickshaw once again to watch this happen. He’s optimistic about the outcome of the bout. “I hope Minakshi does well. I only drive an auto rickshaw, but it will be good to see her on top of the world,” he says.

Published on Sep 14, 2025