Hijab-clad Majizia Bhanu from Kerala eyes gold in World Arm Wrestling Championship
“I am an ordinary Muslim woman. Hijab is part of my everyday outfit. I never found it odd to wear it during competitions. No sports association has stopped me from using Hijab so far.”
This is Majizia Bhanu, 24, a multi-talented sports women from Orkkatteri village in Kerala’s Kozhikode district, who has been winning medals in three different power-centric sports events – arm wrestling, bodybuilding and powerlifting – since 2017.
Bhanu, a fourth year Bachelor of Dental Surgery student at the Mahe Institute of Dental Sciences, is now busy preparing for the 40th World Arm Wrestling Championship to be held in Antalya in Turkey from October 13 to 21.
She made the cut with a stunning performance in her debut in the national arm wrestling championship in Lucknow this May. The hijab-clad woman overpowered her rivals in 55 kg weight category with consummate ease for the gold and a ticket to the Worlds.
Not many knew that she took to the sport only a month before the national championships. “I found the arm wrestling table for the first time when I entered the fray in the Kozhikode district championship in April 2018,” she said.
After winning the district championships, she participated in the state-level event where she defeated reigning champion Praveena to qualify for the national championships. The rest, as they say, is history.
In February 2018, Bhanu hogged all the limelight when she was adjudged the best woman bodybuilder of Kerala. Wearing a full body black suit and a headscarf, she displayed her physique through four mandatory postures at the state championship in Kochi. The win earned her the moniker ‘Hijab-clad strong woman of Kerala’.
“I participated in the event only after getting assurance from the organisers that I would be allowed to compete wearing the full body suit and head scarf,” she said. “I never trained for it, but I was confident of my capabilities. My coach sent me photos of a few body building poses via WhatsApp hours before the competition. It helped me fetch the title,” she added.
Bhanu’s tryst with power sports began in 2017. “I began training in powerlifting in 2017 January,” she said. Five months later, she won medals in national and international competitions. “I consider my runner-up performance in Asian Powerlifting Championship in Indonesia in May 2017 as the best in my career so far,” she said.
Passion for sports
Sports has been Bhanu’s passion since her childhood. “When I was a child I knew that I had the same power as my boy counterparts. I used to challenge them in sports,” she said.
She participated in inter-school competitions in high jump and long jump till Class 10. “She was one of the energetic girls in our school. She gave her best shot in inter-school competitions,” said Surendran, her physical education teacher till Class 10 at the Islamic Academy Higher Secondary School in Vadakara in Kozhikode district.
She joined K Kunhirama Kurup Memorial Higher Secondary School near her home for Class XI and Class XII, where she continued to take part in competitions. “I shifted my focus to track events and won many titles in 100m hurdles in the inter-school competitions,” Bhanu said. “Hijab continued to be my companion then.”
Her focus shifted to power sports after she decided to study dental surgery. “It all started when I got a one-month break from college in December 2016,” she said.
Bhanu enrolled herself in a boxing training academy in Kozhikode, which is 50 km from her house. A couple of days later, her coach suggested to her to pursue powerlifting. “He told me that my body movements were fit for powerlifting, so I began working out at the Jaya Gym in Kozhikode for two days in a week.”
Bhanu said bench press troubled her in the beginning, but she overcame it with regular training. “I also faced little trouble with squat and dead lifts,” she said.
A couple of months later she moved to Hamstring Fitness Centre near her home in Vadakara and began to train under Shammas Abdul Latheef.
“My performance has been improving by the day. Now I can lift a total of 425 kg, with 175 kg of squat, 160 kg of dead lift and 90 kg in bench press.”
Coach Latheef felt that Bhanu has the capacity to win more laurels. “She is a passionate sportswoman. She has made it a habit to visit the gym even on busy days. She works out almost every day and it shows in her results,” he said.
Financial support
Her participation in the World Arm wrestling Championship in Turkey was in doubt as she couldn’t pay Rs 5 lakh before June 10. “I would have missed the event had I not deposited the amount in my bank account before June 10. I had knocked many doors for help. Timely help from a group of well-wishers from Kerala and Dubai saved me,” she said.
She hopes that the difficult phase of her career is over with a Dubai-based company – Bronet Group – choosing her as the brand ambassador on Tuesday.
She had missed the World Classic Powerlifting Championship in Canada owing to paucity of funds. “I don’t have a proper training facility or the support of nutrition expert and physiotherapist. Hope things will change from now on,” she said.
Bhanu said her family played a big role in moulding her sporting career. “I couldn’t have dreamed of these achievements without my family’s support,” she said.
Her father Abdul Majeed is a Karate exponent and her mother Raziya Majeed has always been her source of encouragement. Her younger brother Mohammed Nizamuddin is a budding choreographer.
“I am proud of my daughter’s achievement,” said her mother Raziya. “It is a good thing that she is winning medals without compromising her religious practices,” she added.
With 40 medals of various hues under her belt, Bhanu says she will never miss an opportunity to increase the tally.
She says she can fulfil her dream if powerlifting becomes an Olympic sport. If it doesn’t happen soon, she will not hesitate to take a plunge into weightlifting. “I can become a champion weightlifter by tweaking my techniques.”
But for the time being, Bhanu’s is fully focussing on the world championship. “I want to win the gold in Turkey.” “I will put in my best efforts to return with the yellow metal,” she said.
courtesy : scroll.in
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Actress sexual assault: Court says Prosecution 'miserably' failed to prove conspiracy against Dileep
Kochi (PTI): The prosecution had "miserably" failed to prove the conspiracy charge against Dileep in the sensational 2017 actress sexual assault case, a local court has observed while citing inconsistencies and lack of sufficient evidence against the Malayalam star.
The full judgement of Ernakulam District and Principal Sessions Court Judge Honey M Varghese was released late on Friday, and has revealed the judge also pointing out at unsustainable arguments put forth by the prosecution.
"The prosecution miserably failed to prove the conspiracy between accused No.1 (Pulsar Suni) and accused No.8 (Dileep) in executing the offence against the victim," the court held.
It examined in detail, the prosecution's allegation that Dileep had hired the prime accused to sexually assault the survivor and record visuals, including close-up footage of a gold ring she was wearing, to establish her identity.
On page 1130 of the judgment, under paragraph 703, the court framed the issue as whether the prosecution's contention that NS Sunil (Pulsar Suni) recorded visuals of the gold ring worn by the victim at the time of the occurrence, so as to clearly disclose her identity, was sustainable.
The prosecution contended Dileep and Suni had planned the recording so that the actress' identity would be unmistakable, with the video of the gold ring intended to convince Dileep that the visuals were genuine.
However, the court noted that this contention was not stated in the first charge sheet and was introduced only in the second one.
As part of this claim, a gold ring was seized after the victim produced it before the police.
The court observed that multiple statements of the victim were recorded from February 18, 2017, following the incident, and that she first raised allegations against Dileep only on June 3, 2017.
Even on that day, nothing was mentioned about filming of the ring as claimed by the prosecution, the court said.
The prosecution failed to explain why the victim did not disclose this fact at the earliest available opportunities.
It further noted that although the victim had viewed the sexual assault visuals twice, she did not mention any specific recording of the gold ring on those occasions, which remained unexplained.
The court also examined the approvers' statements.
One approver told the magistrate that Dileep had instructed Pulsar Suni to record the victim's wedding ring.
The court observed that no such wedding ring was available with her at that time.
During the trial, the approver changed his version, the court said.
The Special Public Prosecutor put a leading question to the approver on whether Dileep had instructed the recording of the ring, after which he deposed that the instruction was to record it to prove the victim's identity.
The court observed that the approver changed his account to corroborate the victim's evidence.
When the same question was put to another approver, he repeated the claim during the trial but admitted he had never stated this fact before the investigating officer.
The court noted that the second approver even went to the extent of claiming Dileep had instructed the execution of the crime as the victim's engagement was over.
This showed that the evidence of the second approver regarding the shooting of the ring was untrue, as her engagement had taken place after the crime.
The court further observed that the visuals themselves clearly revealed the victim's identity and that there was no need to capture images of the ring to establish identity.
In paragraph 887, the court examined the alleged motive behind the crime and noted that in the first charge sheet, the prosecution had claimed that accused persons 1 to 6 had kidnapped the victim with the common intention of capturing nude visuals to extort money by threatening to circulate them and there was no mention about Dileep's role in it.
The court also rejected the prosecution's claim that the accused had been planning the assault on Dileep's instructions since 2013, noting that the allegation was not supported by reliable evidence.
It similarly ruled out the claim that Suni attempted to sexually assault the victim in Goa in January 2017, stating that witness statements showed no such misconduct when he served as the driver of the vehicle used by the actress there.
The court also discussed various controversies that followed Dileep's arrest and the evidence relied upon by the prosecution, ultimately finding that the case had not been proved.
Pronouning its verdict on the sensational case on December 8, the court acquitted Dileep and three others.
Later, the court sentenced six accused, including the prime accused Suni, to 20 years' rigorous imprisonment.
The assault on the multilingual actress, after the accused allegedly forced their way into her car and held it under their control for two hours on February 17, 2017, had shocked Kerala.
Pulsar Suni sexually assaulted the actress and video recorded the act with the help of the other convicted persons in the moving car.
