Call Heath Matthews, the South African physiotherapist to the Indian boxing team, and one of the Bhiwani boys picks up the phone. Ask them to account for their ambition, and Akhil Kumar says, talk to Heath about it. He knows us, he will explain it well, he says.

With his ringside view of India’s Olympic boxers, Matthews is perhaps best placed to convey what it is that makes boxing and India’s fivesome so different and so intriguing. Best placed simply because he came to the sport and to the squad just a year ago, so he can still summon a sense of distance and the freshness of the newly conquered.

“Boxing appeals at a very primal level,” he says. “It has all the essential elements that appeal to you, at a slightly deeper level. It’s hand to hand combat. The action is bell to bell, you cannot back down for a second. Therefore, the kind of bravery this sport requires as a standard is different from other sports. Besides character and courage under fire, boxing requires the attributes of other sports too: fitness, agility, reflex. It needs a big heart.”

Beijing 2008 has been the coming out party for Indian boxing — three boxers (Vijender Kumar, Jitender Kumar and Akhil Kumar) made the quarterfinals and tomorrow afternoon, Vijender fights a bout for a spot in the 75 kg final. Their story is all the more captivating for its distinctive markers. The trio, along with a fourth boxer at the Games, Dinesh Kumar, are from a boxing club in Bhiwani. With an equally engaging fifth boxer, A.L. Lakra, they have shown the capacity to enthrall, to be the men who take their sport’s popularity to the tipping point.

... contd.