The 2025 World Wrestling Championships in Zagreb, Croatia, offered Indian wrestling a reality check.
What unfolded was not simply another campaign but a study in contrasts moments of resilience and achievement from the women’s squad overshadowed by disappointment and systemic failings on the men’s side.
India ended with a solitary bronze medal, courtesy of Antim Panghal, ensuring the country maintained its streak of podium finishes since 2018. Yet, the overall performance left far more questions than answers, particularly concerning the men’s freestyle and Greco-Roman contingents.
Antim Panghal: The Lone Beacon of Success
At just 21, Antim Panghal has already etched her name among India’s finest wrestlers. Competing in the 53kg women’s freestyle category, she delivered the only moment of celebration for the Indian team, clinching her second consecutive World Championship bronze.
Panghal’s campaign was a showcase of tactical maturity and mental resilience. She opened with a dominant 10-0 win over Spain’s Carla Jaume Soler, demonstrating her attacking sharpness. In the quarterfinals, she edged past China’s Zhang Jin in a nerve-racking 9-8 battle, displaying grit under pressure. The semifinal against Ecuador’s Olympic silver medallist Lucía Yépez was a heartbreaker, with Panghal going down 5-3 in a tight contest.
Yet, she bounced back strongly in the bronze medal bout, defeating Sweden’s Jonna Malmgren 9-1 an opponent she had recently lost to in 2024.
This ability to adjust and deliver when it mattered highlighted Panghal’s elite mindset. With this medal, she became only the second Indian woman, after Vinesh Phogat, to win multiple World Championship medals.
Her success was not just personal. It extended India’s record of winning at least one World Championship medal every year since 2018, underlining the consistency of the women’s program.
The Women’s Squad: Depth and Resilience
While Panghal stood on the podium, the broader women’s team showed resilience that the men’s squads sorely lacked. India finished tied 10th in the women’s team rankings with 35 points, a sign of depth and competitiveness.
Asian champion Manisha Bhanwala (62kg) reached the repechage, narrowly missing out on a medal opportunity after falling to a Bulgarian rival. Priya Malik (76kg) also advanced to the repechage and ended in fifth place after a close defeat. These performances, though medal-less, are important markers of progress.
The fact that India’s women have maintained medal consistency at World Championships for nearly a decade speaks volumes about their training systems, scouting, and ability to produce wrestlers who can compete against the world’s best.
Men’s Freestyle: A Story of Collapse
In stark contrast, the men’s freestyle contingent endured one of its darkest campaigns in recent memory. With a full-strength squad, India failed to win a single medal. High-profile setbacks and underwhelming performances summed up a disappointing campaign.
Aman Sehrawat’s Disqualification
The most shocking episode was the disqualification of Olympic bronze medallist Aman Sehrawat in the 57kg category. Touted as India’s best medal hope, he failed to make weight by 1.7kg at the official weigh-in. Reports suggested that a fever disrupted his final weight cut, but this incident raised troubling questions about athlete management and preparation.
The Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) has signaled potential disciplinary action, citing precedent where a junior wrestler was banned for two years for being just 700g overweight. A strict penalty, however, risks sidelining a key medal prospect during his prime years, raising the debate on whether rigid discipline or pragmatic management serves the sport better.
Mukul Dahiya’s Near Miss
Mukul Dahiya (86kg) was the only male wrestler to reach a medal bout. After navigating the repechage, he faced Iran’s Kamran Ghasempour, a former world champion, in the bronze medal match. Fatigue and a clear technical gulf were evident as Dahiya lost 0-10 by technical superiority. Though his run showed determination, it also highlighted the gap between Indian wrestlers and the very top tier.
Other Disappointments
Sujeet Kalkal (65kg), who had shown strong form earlier in the season, lost narrowly 5-6 to Iran’s Olympic medallist Rahman Khalili in the quarterfinals before falling out in repechage. Deepak Punia (92kg), a 2019 silver medallist, suffered an early exit at the hands of a three-time world medallist from Azerbaijan.
Across categories, inconsistency and inability to convert close bouts into wins defined India’s campaign.
Greco-Roman: A Persistent Weakness
If the men’s freestyle was disappointing, the Greco-Roman contingent’s performance bordered on alarming. None of the Indian wrestlers managed a single win.
The defeats were comprehensive Anil Mor (55kg) and Aman (77kg) both lost 8-0 to world-class opponents, while Rahul (82kg) and Sonu (130kg) suffered similar fates.
India has only ever won one Greco-Roman World Championship medal a bronze in 2013 by Sandeep Yadav. Twelve years later, the struggles persist, exposing a structural weakness in grassroots development, coaching expertise, and training infrastructure. Without a complete overhaul, India risks remaining non-competitive in this discipline indefinitely.
The divergence in results between India’s men’s and women’s programs is striking. While women continue to produce consistent results, men’s freestyle has regressed, and Greco-Roman remains stagnant. Several themes emerge:
- Athlete Management Failures – Sehrawat’s weight issue exemplifies a breakdown in medical and nutritional oversight. In elite sport, margins are fine, and even minor lapses have major consequences.
- Technical Gaps at the Elite Level – Matches against Iran, Azerbaijan, and other wrestling powerhouses exposed clear deficiencies in Indian wrestlers’ ability to finish bouts and resist technical superiority.
- Depth vs. Dependence – Women’s wrestling now boasts multiple athletes capable of reaching repechage rounds, while men remain dependent on a few stars who are struggling to convert opportunities.
- Structural Weakness in Greco-Roman – India’s neglect of this discipline has left it a non-factor on the world stage for over a decade. Without international collaboration and grassroots investment, improvement is unlikely.
Learning from the Women’s Blueprint
If there is a roadmap for progress, it lies in the women’s program. Consistent investment, exposure, and development have built a pipeline of talent.
The model demonstrates that India can compete globally with proper planning and execution. Extending this model to the men’s side with improved athlete management systems, global training partnerships, and technical refinement should be the next step.
Looking forward, Indian wrestling faces critical decisions. The 2025 campaign has exposed cracks that cannot be ignored. For the men, urgent reforms are needed—beginning with improved sports science support, mental conditioning, and technical training.
For Greco-Roman, a generational rebuild is overdue. For the women, the focus should be on sustaining the current momentum and preparing for even greater success at Los Angeles 2028.
The 2025 World Wrestling Championships will be remembered not just for Antim Panghal’s brilliance but also for the collective failures that surrounded it. One medal saved India from a shutout, but the deeper story is the widening gap between promise and performance, especially among the men.
If Indian wrestling is to reclaim its reputation as a global force, it must learn from its women’s team, address systemic flaws, and chart a long-term vision.
The lessons from Zagreb are clear: resilience alone is not enough; structure, discipline, and foresight are essential. Only then can India hope to rise again as a wrestling powerhouse on both men’s and women’s fronts.
