After the war, Nyein painted for a living with the Allied soldiers. He was the champion of the Kyar-Hto game, which is a Burmese variant of the board game Draughts. He got his nickname "Kyar" from the famous Burmese Draughts player in Mandalay, Ba Than Gyi who taught him the tactics and strategy of the game. He soon adopted the nickname "Kyar Kalay". In the 1974 boxing tournament, he won the Bantamweight class and became Champion, and newspapers started to call him Kyar Kalay Ba Nyein. This was later changed to Kyar Ba Nyein. When he established the Golden tiger boxing club, his ring name was firmly established as Kyar Ba Nyein.
Achievements
Ba Nyein was awarded “The best boxer who used scientific techniques” award in 1949.. His best known match occurred in 1951 with the Indian featherweight Champion P. Bose. The Indian team won six matches against Burmese contenders, but Kyar Ba Nyein bested the Indian in that match. P. Bose, who Kyar Ba Nyein defeated, was India’s best featherweight champion and was selected to represent India twice in the previous Olympics. Because of this, Kyar Ba Nyein was selected to compete on behalf of Burma in the 15th Olympics held in Helsinki, Finland, in 1952. Ba Nyein was sent to Bangkok for International Boxing Association's Refereeexamination.
Ba Nyein started as a volunteerSportsReporter for the 'Ludu' newspaper and the 'Ludu Journal', following his younger brother Ba Thein, who was already a reporter at that newspaper. His numerous articles, stories on World Boxing matches, news reports, and sports news commentaries were later published regularly in magazines and journals such as: Myawaddy, Thwe Thauk, Mogyo and Tagun. His first book published was, “Blood on the sand”.
Voluntary works and training young boxers
He was the first Burmese to train youths on the street. He established Golden Tiger Boxing clubs in Dah dan 25th street and another near the Burma Muslim Congress on 83rd street. He trained hundreds of young boxers, and was appointed a boxing trainer in 1954 by the National Fitness Council. Ye Chit, Ye Swe, Ye Myint and Ye Tint were the boxers he trained from Mandalay. Tint Tun, Alexandria and Hla Shwe from Rangoon were also his trainees. Kyar Ba Nyein was so proud about the success of his boxers that he once told Ludu Daw Ah Mar that he never got serious injuries or scars during his 50 boxing matches, including seven with foreigners. But he got multiple scars, while training his boxers, because he allowed his trainees to hit him during training sessions, to teach in a practical way: how to fight back without retreating to avoid the opponent’s assault.
Kyar Ba Nyein was a pioneer who drew up the modern scientific rules and regulations that have been used since 1953 for Burmese traditional boxing, or Lethwei. He went around all of Burma, especially up to the Mon and Karen states, near Thailand, where there are a lot of villagers actively training in Lethwei. He brought some fighters back to Mandalay and Rangoon. He then trained them with the new methods and encouraged them to fight in the Burmese traditional boxing matches, which he had organized around the country and even once, in October 1960, to Beijing and Shanghai, China where he led about 100 boxers to show Lethwei, at the signing ceremony of the Burma-China border treaty. At that time the group leader of the Burmese delegation was Lieutenant ColonelAung Gyi. He also organized goodwill matches by leading a group of Burmese traditional boxers to Thailand. Kyar Ba Nyein died in 1979 suffering from rectal cancer.
