‘India’s first woman wrestler was Muslim’

Deepender Deswal

Tribune News Service

Hisar, December 31

Tejpal Dalal, wrestling historian-cum-mathematics teacher, has penned a book documenting the rise of women wrestling in Haryana.

Dalal, resident of Mandothi village in Jhajjar district, had revealed in his book, which was released last week, that the first Indian woman wrestler, Hamida Bano, was a Muslim, who belonged to a family of wrestlers in Uttar Pradesh. He said she had defeated quite a few wrestlers during 1950s. “She had declared that she would marry a person who would defeat her in the ‘dangal’,” he said, maintaining that it was not clear whether she married or not.

Talking to The Tribune, Dalal, who is a mathematics teacher in Delhi, said during his research on the book, wrestling lovers told him that Hamida was fond of organising ‘dangal’ after she retired from wrestling. “She had also visited Jhajjar town to watch Randhawa, younger brother of famed wrestler Dara Singh, wrestle against Kapoor Singh of Mandothi village in 1970,” he said.

He said another woman wrestler, daughter of Nanhe Pahalwan from Weir town of Bharatpur district in Rajasthan, had also earned a name in wrestling during 1960s.

He said there were women wrestlers in the USA and other western countries during 1930. But Indian women lagged behind due to social prejudices as wrestling was considered an exclusive male sport in India.

However, Dalal said the credit to introduce modern women wrestling went to Master Chandagi Ram, who, in 1997, introduced two of his daughters in the contact sport. One of his daughters, Sonika Kaliraman, became the first woman Hind Kesari. “Later, Hisar wrestler-turned-coach Udey Chand introduced women wrestling in HAU in Hisar, which has established as a centre of women wrestling. Later, besides Haryana, girls in Punjab, UP, MP and Maharastra also got introduced to wrestling.

Dalal said he was working to establish a museum of the articles and instruments used by wrestlers in his Mandothi village. “I have collected antique articles from several places of the country, which would be displayed in the museum,” he added.