After Dubai title, Pakistan's rising boxing star sets sights on Olympic prize

QUETTA: Syed Asif Ali Shah Hazara was still in junior high school, sparring occasionally with friends, when one of his teachers encouraged him to pursue boxing. The motivation was life changing.

Acting upon his teacher's advice, the young athlete from Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province took part in an inter-school boxing championship in Quetta, the provincial capital, and won it.

Inspired by the success, he kept on training and in 2014 clinched the silver medal in a tournament held in Taiwan. In 2015, he won gold in Iran.

"In 2020, I moved into professional (boxing). By the grace of God, I fought four professional fights and I am unbeaten," Hazara told Arab News during training at the Qayoum Papa Stadium in Quetta.

"I am a seven times national champion. I have also served as captain of the Pakistan boxing team. I have many international medals of the Commonwealth Games, Asian Games and South Asian Games."

The 28-year-old's most recent success was Asian Boxing Federation Flyweight Championship in Dubai in March, where he knocked out Indonesian challenger Asyer Aluman and won the golden belt.

"By the grace of God, right now I am the Asian title champion," he said.

The path to glory was not one without challenges, the biggest of which came from Hazara's own family.

His father, Syed Nazeer Hussain, who worked as a night watchman, had nine mouths to feed and wanted his son to focus on education rather than sports to get a better chance in life.

But the young boxer did not want to forgo boxing and would hide training sessions from his parents until eventually they noticed his talent.

"Despite our family’s economic woes, Asif has never asked me for financial assistance and has been achieving his goals through his own hard work," Hussain told Arab News.  

"When I realized that he has professional boxing skills, I decided to let him free for his dreams."

Hazara is now training under the eye of Hasratullah Changezi, who brought Pakistan its first gold boxing medal in 1979.

“I have been coaching him since 2017 and I have found him very hardworking and determined toward his boxing career," Changezi said.

He is training Hazara to fight in 20 Asian championships, a requirement for any boxer to qualify for global competitions.  

And he believes his protege will succeed and emerge as an international star.

"He has to go for 20 boxing fights in Asia and after that he will be ready for the world," he said. "We are with him, we will keep training him."

Hazara said he looks up to Pakistan's two superstar athletes: Imran Khan — the cricket hero prime minister who won the country's first and only World Cup in 1992, and Jahangir Khan, who is widely regarded as the world's greatest squash player of all time.

"I want to become Pakistan’s first global boxing champion, he said. "My mission is to fight in the Olympics and my target is to represent my province, my country, and my caste and earn glory for Pakistan. The day is not far."