Boxer Pinky Jangra causes upset to win gold

Jamshedpur, Feb 24 (PTI) Haryana''s Pinky Jangra, whocreated a flutter by defeating five-time world champion M CMary Kom two years ago, caused another upset today in women''sfly weight (51 kg) class when she outclassed reigning SeniorNational champion and former Asian championship medallist LSarita Devi of Manipur in the final to clinch the gold.

The 21-year-old, who had earned lots of accolades aftertrouncing Mary Kom in the quarter-final round of the seniorwomen''s national boxing championship in 2009 at the same venuehere, put up a stiff challenge against the 26-year-oldManipuri girl.

Both the boxers were locked scoreless till the thirdround before Jangra went all out to snatch five quick pointsin the last round to leave her opponent stunned.

Jangra exhibited a combination of footwork and powerfulpunches as Sarita, who is a medal prospect in the LondonOlympics, made abortive attempt to surpass. But the youngsterperfectly blocked her punches.

This is Jangra''s first gold in the National games.

In another bout, national champion Vanlal Duati (Tripura)continued her winning streak as she brushed aside KrishnaThapa of Madhya Pradesh 7-2 in a closely contested final boutof the women''s light fly (48 kg) class.

Duati, who trounced Monita Devi of Arunachal Pradesh inthe final of the 11th senior national boxing championshipheld at Thrissur in last December, maintained her lead rightfrom the first round even though Thapa kept on mountingpressure by grabbing points.

Duati went aggressive in the last round and deliveredaccurate punches to fetch four points to turn the bout in herfavour.

In the men''s light fly (49 kgs) bout, Internationalrepute Th Nanao Singh (Manipur) defeated CWG bronze medalistAmandeep Singh (Punjab) in a tough contested bout 5-3.

Taking the bout from blue corner, Singh did not allow hisrival to take an upper hand in the first two rounds, whichended up locked at 0-0 and 1-1.

But then Nanao started to attack and despite a stiffresistance from Singh, extended the lead to 4-2 in the lastround to grab the yellow medal.

An International, Mishal Banjamin Lakra (Jharkhand), whois the cousin of International medallist Anthresh Lakra,opened the account on a winning note for his state when hedefeated Shiva Thapa (Assam) 4-1 to win gold in the Bantam 56kgs weight class.

Sunil Kumar of Haryana beat Santosh Harijan (Goa) 4-0 tobag the gold metal.