Mumbai: When things get hazy in the mind, Parveen Hooda gets down to writing in her diary. Around mid-2025, while the boxer was serving a doping suspension due to a whereabouts failure, she could neither see a road ahead nor figure out why she kept training.
Event Context
At Hooda’s last multi-sport event, the 2023 Hangzhou Asian Games, she secured the 57kg bronze medal and a quota for the 2024 Paris Olympics. Two months ahead of what would have been her debut Games, she was banned for three whereabouts failures.
Serving a backdated 14-month suspension from May 2024 with her Asian medal scratched, Hooda wondered if she would ever be able to return to such a stage.
“All through last year, I prayed that somehow I get a chance to represent India in an event like this again. I had plenty of doubts about whether it could happen, because I was out for a long time. Now that I’m finally here at the CWG, it feels so good,” she said.
The feeling through those months of inaction was more of fear. “Of whether I would be able to come back at all or not.”
From being close to her peak in 57kg when she was banned, Hooda had to halt, pause, reset and start from scratch again.
“It was very challenging,” she said. “When you have no competitions to aim for and no targets for over a year, you don’t know what to train for. And even if you train, the motivation is largely down.”
It would get dragged further with the outside noise from people around her.
“During my comeback phase, people would tell me, ‘That was your peak period, why were you so careless? You missed out on an Olympics, it won’t be easy to get there again.’ I heard so many such negative things,” she said.
England’s Sacha Hickey will be her first test in the quarter-finals in Glasgow. The CWG is “extremely important” for Hooda. Not just to build experience against boxers in her new category with the 2028 Olympics in mind, but also to gain more confidence from the first major multi-sport stop of her comeback journey.
“I want to win a medal. But just to be here once again, it feels good.”
Player Focus
Along with her family, she moved from their village in Rurki, Haryana to Rohtak to train “without any distractions”. A shoulder injury kept her away for three months during the suspension before Hooda made her competitive return last October in 60kg.
Match Outlook
And so, she went back to her diary, spelling out her main targets for the next few years. “For 2026, I wrote Commonwealth Games and Asian Games — that I have to be there and represent the country again,” she said.
When Hooda, 26, steps on the ring at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games (CWG) on Tuesday for her opening 65kg bout, she will be doing just that. After a gap of three years in a multi-sport event.
“It has been a long, painful wait,” she told HT from Glasgow.
On the outside, she would respond with a sense of assurance. “But deep inside, it made me question myself — that maybe they are right, maybe it will be really difficult, maybe I won’t get another chance.”
In this sea of negativity, doubts and fear, waves of positive calm came from her family, psychologist, and a philosophical look back at her career.
“I had reached so many highs. I had a chance to go to the Olympics. It would have been a lifetime regret had I not tried to make a comeback. So, the only solution I found was to not give up, get back to it and not have any regrets. I didn’t want a mistake to dictate my life. And I didn’t want to live in guilt all my life.”
A gold on her international return at the World Boxing Cup Finals gave her the belief that “I still belong here and that next year I could aim for big things”. However, with a spot in 60kg already taken, Hooda had to move up to 65kg.
“It was a little difficult initially, especially since there was a difference of 5kg straight. I had to suddenly turn a lot of my attention to strength and diet.”
Strength training went up from twice a week to thrice, and protein was increased in her diet. A natural counter-attacker, Hooda made technical adjustments for taller and stronger opponents. “The competition is tough in this category, it has a lot of hard-hitters,” she said.
