KOCHI: A three-time national champion in Kyokushin full-contact karate, 39-year-old Renjith Balan has launched a mission to train girls in self-defence. The karate master won the third position at the 2014 Asian Championship held in Malaysia and has trained Dubai police personnel, Russian Army persons, Indian Navy officers and Kerala police officers. Currently, he runs the Bodhidharma Martial Arts Academy at Maradu in Kochi.
“The increasing sexual harassment incidents of girls prompted me to offer a training programme to make them physically and mentally strong. While most karate institutes offer sport karate where the candidates are trained for competitions, Kyokushin is full-contact karate where the opponent is knocked down. I have trained both my daughters in the format and they have become self-confident,” said Renjith. Kyokushin fighting techniques include kicks, knee strikes and hand skills. The technique sufficiently stuns the opponent in such a way that he is unable to resume fighting within five seconds.
Renjith, who has been practising kalari and karate for the past 25 years, is also a trained yoga master. He worked as a karate trainer in Dubai for 10 years and won the UAE national championship in 2009 and 2015. He was selected as the best performer in the International Federation Karate championship held in Sharjah in 2017 was adjudged the best performer in the 2016 UAE Yoga Championship. He is a fourth-degree karate black belt holder and the India branch chief of Karatenomichi World Federation.
“I went to Dubai as a karate trainer in 2007 under karate master Sudhir Ghosh and worked there for 10 years. I had the opportunity to train people from Ireland, Russia, Brazil, the USA, Mauritius, Morocco, Nepal and Bangladesh. I also had the opportunity to get trained in Arnis, the stick-wielding Filipino martial arts for six years in the UAE. Arnis is a fierce martial art, where we are trained to use sticks as an extension of hands. A girl can roll up a book and use it as a weapon to immobilise the attacker,” said Renjith.
A native of Ponnani in Malappuram, he joined karate and kalari classes at the age of 10. Ustad Kutty Ahamed imparted training in kalari while Marakkatt Devadas was his master in karate. Later he got trained at a Kalari training centre at Muttil in Wayanad for three years. He learned Kalari massage from Alavi Ustad and Valsan Gurukkal in Kannur. In 2000, he went to Haridwar to join Baba Ramdev Ashram to get trained in Yoga. “We have students from the ages of seven to 60, including an 86-year-old grandmother Kamala at Bodhidharma Martial Arts Academy,” he said.