Assam teenager Monojit Deb wins national arm wrestling gold, eyes Tokyo

Monojit Deb turned a national championship trip to Bengaluru into a gold medal and, with it, a place on India’s road to Tokyo. The 18-year-old from Badarpur, under Katigorah constituency in Assam’s Cachar district, won the Board Control Arm Wrestling of India National Arm Wrestling Championship held from June 12 to 14.

The result lands differently because Deb built it without the usual trappings of an elite prospect. He did it without a coach or a fancy gym, which makes the win look less like a lucky weekend and more like a talent gap he bridged on his own. In arm wrestling, where table time, technique work and repeated live matches matter, that kind of rise is the real story: not just raw strength, but the ability to keep showing up against better-prepared opponents.

Now the route gets harder. Deb’s gold has put him on course to represent India at the International Federation of Armwrestling World Championship in Tokyo, and that is where the support system starts to matter as much as the hand grip. Moving from Assam to a national title and then into an international campaign means more travel, more exposure to high-level opposition and more structured preparation than a one-off breakthrough usually demands.

India already has some weight on the world stage, and that gives Deb’s move a clearer context. At the 2024 World Armwrestling Championships in Chisinau, Moldova, the Indian contingent won 15 medals while competing under the People’s Armwrestling Federation of India, led by president Preeti Jhangiani. The same World Championship run also produced another milestone for the region when Ibi Lollen of Arunachal Pradesh became the first woman referee from India to officiate at the event.

The domestic pipeline has also grown stronger. Pro Panja League’s 2022 ranking tournament drew more than 1,100 registered arm-wrestlers, including 897 men, 174 women and 37 specially-abled athletes, and 180 players were later drafted into six teams for the league’s inaugural season. Season 2 was set to begin in Gwalior on August 5, 2025, underscoring how much more competition now sits between a local standout and a world-stage call-up.

Deb is also stepping into a northeast corridor that has already produced repeat continental results. Assam’s Manoj Debnath won bronze in Hanoi after taking Asian gold in Malaysia in 2022, while Arunachal Pradesh’s Ibi Lollen collected two bronze medals at the Asian Arm Wrestling Championship in Ajman, United Arab Emirates. For Deb, the Bengaluru gold is the opening of that conversation, not the end of it.