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"Perhaps he's busy at the construction site," Monikha Sonowal quipped as she tried calling her father again.
Moments earlier, Monikha had clinched the gold medal in the women's 48kg weightlifting category at the inaugural Khelo India Tribal Games 2026 in Raipur and wanted to convey the news to her father, Padmadhar Sonowal, a mason who spends long days at construction sites to support his family of four and has been the 19-year-old's biggest supporter in her sporting journey. Elder of the two siblings, Monikha hails from Batghoria Penbeni Chowk, a small and largely unnoticed locality in Assam's Dhemaji district, located on the north bank of the Brahmaputra River and situated approximately 425 kms away from Guwahati. Life there moves at a quiet, unhurried pace, and for most families in the village, dreams rarely stretch beyond family responsibilities and making ends meet, according to a press release from the KITG 2026. But for Monikha, the sound of barbells inside a weightlifting hall became the soundtrack of a dream that refused to stay small. Despite limited resources, her curiosity towards the sport gradually transformed into a passion, inspired by the global success of Tokyo Olympics silver medallist Mirabai Chanu from neighbouring Manipur. And on Thursday, that dream transformed into a moment of national glory as she battled a knee injury to clinch the first weightlifting gold medal of the Games, capping off the hard work she had been putting in ever since she took up the sport a few years ago. A major turning point in her journey came two years ago when she joined the Sports Authority of India's National Centre of Excellence (NCOE) in Itanagar. "The NCOE Itanagar gave me everything an athlete from a small village like mine could only dream of. Proper training, nutrition and guidance, along with injury management. Without that support, reaching this level would have been very difficult," said Monikha, who belongs to the Kachari Tribe. Her progress since then has been steady. Monikha won gold at the School Nationals in 2023, followed by a silver medal at the Khelo India ASMITA League in Sambalpur, Odisha, in 2024. In 2025, she secured a bronze medal at the State Championships in Tezpur and finished eighth at the Inter-University Championships in Chandigarh. But the road to her latest triumph was far from smooth. For the past three months, Monikha, a BA second-semester student at Dhemaji City College, had been struggling with a right knee injury sustained during training. Concerned about aggravating the problem, her coaches advised her to skip the Khelo India Tribal Games. But the 19-year-old weightlifter could not bring herself to stay away. Monika chose to compete and fight through the pain. "My coaches were worried about my knee and told me it might be better to rest," she recalled. "But opportunities like the Khelo India Tribal Games don't come often. I didn't want to miss competing on such a big stage. "I want to keep improving and represent India one day. This gold is just the beginning," Monikha added. (ANI)
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