Kota's rebel daughter chose Olympic dreams over IITs. Now Arundhati Choudhary is a Commonwealth champion

The victory was another giant step in a journey few could have imagined, not least because it began in Kota.

India capped off its greatest-ever boxing campaign at the Commonwealth Games on Saturday. Seven gold medals and three silvers not only marked the country's best boxing haul, but also the most successful performance by any nation in the sport's history at the Games.

Gold medallist India's Arundhati Choudhary poses for photographs during the presentation ceremony after the women's 70kg final boxing event at the 23rd Commonwealth Games (CWG), in Glasgow (PTI)

Among those champions was Arundhati Choudhary, who defeated world bronze medallist Chantelle Reid in the women's 70kg final, just a day after eliminating the defending Commonwealth champion.

The victory was another giant step in a journey few could have imagined, not least because it began in Kota.

The Rajasthan city has long been synonymous with coaching institutes, where thousands of students chase engineering and medical seats every year. Arundhati was expected to follow the same path. She excelled in mathematics, and her father, Suresh Choudhary, a businessman with no connection to sport, believed she would eventually crack one of India's toughest entrance examinations.

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Instead, she came to him with a different dream. Rather than competing for an engineering seat, Arundhati told her father she wanted to win an Olympic gold medal.

"She asked me how many students clear the IAS and IIT entrance exams," Suresh recalled in an interview with Sportstar. "Then she asked me how many Indians had won an Olympic gold medal. At that time, I only knew of Abhinav Bindra. When I told her, she said she wanted to become the first Indian woman to do the same."

It was an audacious ambition, and not just because of the Olympics.

Ironically, boxing itself wasn't even her first sporting love. At school, Arundhati captained the basketball team. But her father encouraged her to move to an individual sport, believing success there would depend entirely on her own efforts. She chose boxing—a decision that left him even more sceptical.

"I thought her interest in sport would last only a few months. She was always first or second in class. Her elder sister had cleared medical entrance exams, and I believed Arundhati would do the same. I felt she was wasting her talent."

The odds were stacked against her.

Unlike Haryana, India's boxing powerhouse, Rajasthan offered little infrastructure for aspiring boxers. There was no academy, no established coach, and barely any pathway into the sport. Her family eventually found a local Wushu coach, who had never trained a boxer before. He learned techniques from YouTube videos and passed them on to Arundhati.

Against all odds, it worked. Within a year, she was winning national competitions.

The sacrifices, however, were only beginning. In 2018, competing without headgear, Arundhati suffered repeated blows to the head that resulted in a blood clot. She spent two weeks in hospital. Doctors advised her to quit boxing. Her father wanted the same.

Arundhati refused. Suresh eventually relented, but on one condition—if she continued, she would commit fully to chasing Olympic success rather than settling for smaller milestones.

Her biggest heartbreak came in 2024. During an Olympic qualifying bout, Arundhati learned that her mother had been rushed to the ICU following a medical emergency. Distracted and emotionally drained, she lost the contest—and with it, her chance to compete at the Paris Olympics.

She stepped away from boxing for two months, believing the dream had slipped away. Eventually, she returned with a renewed promise.

"I told myself that if not in 2024, then in 2028. I have to win an Olympic medal, no matter what."

The comeback has been remarkable. Arundhati won the Boxing World Cup Finals in New Delhi, followed it up with gold at the Asian Championships in Ulaanbaatar, and has now added the biggest title of her career—the Commonwealth Games gold.

For many, that would be the destination. For the girl from Kota who walked away from engineering textbooks to chase Olympic history, it remains only another milestone. The medal she has dreamt of since childhood is still waiting.