Veil of Vulnerability

Radhika Shaikh, a Hindu, teaches orthodox Muslim women the art of self defence.

In April 1993, after a season of riots and bomb blasts in Mumbai, Radhika Shaikh started her first martial arts class for Muslim girls. Though a Hindu who got the surname Shaikh after marriage, she had witnessed the trauma of the community’s women and it had left her wanting to do something for them. She was a black belt in karate and already teaching martial arts in a couple of girls’ schools. An NGO, Bazmi-e-Niswan, helped shape her resolve by finding her the students.

“It was not easy to convince parents. They opposed it. They thought it would made their girls look muscular like men,” says Radhika. Initially, the parents sat through every class and insisted that only female instructors conduct it. The school where she started first took a progressive step and added it as part of the curriculum. Word about the class spread to other schools. Another Muslim girls’ school asked her to start the course. Currently, each year, about 150 underprivileged girls pass out of her classes at the junior black belt level.

As her classes became famous, many orthodox Muslim women requested Radhika to take private classes for them. That was how she started teaching burkha-clad women martial arts in a flat in the Muslim-dominated Bhendi Bazaar. Even now, because it might cause problems for the women from hardliners, the classes are not advertised. Since her students belong to the underprivileged classes and the slums, Radhika has reworked the martial arts style to enable them to workout in their salwar-kameez, saris and burkha. “I teach a combination called escrima. It focuses on what is available with you at that time and can be used as weapons. It can be a bag, key chain, thick kada (bangle), umbrella or anything else. I tell the girls to never wait around after a person is distracted. Run for your life. Never wear very tight clothes—it is dangerous as it does not allow us to run,” she says. Escrima is widely practiced in the Philippines.

Forty-three-year-old Radhika is a Gujarati vegetarian. She was married to a meat-loving Arif Shaikh. He was, in fact, the one who trained her. As a child, Radhika had been an extremely shy kid. After college, she joined martial arts classes as her cousin was involved with it. “My family was opposed to it. I faced a similar situation as the girls I teach. My parents, too, thought that it would make me less feminine and I would not get a groom. Having gone through it , I wanted to teach girls who faced similar problems.”

When Arif passed away in an accident three years ago, Radhika was shattered. “I almost gave up but by students encouraged me to get started. My husband loved his art and I want it to live on,” she says.

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