Karate referee-cum-coach excels in his second innings

Renowned karate coach and referee Jagmohan Vij has created a distinct identity for himself in the world of martial arts and karate due to his discipline, dedication and determination. Jagmohan is the first World Karate Federation (WKF) referee from north and central India and is among the only six Indians to achieve the feat. Known for his fair judgment, not even a single protest has come against Jagmohan in his entire refereeing career of 35 years.

Jagmohan has excelled in his second innings, which is resumed after a gap of more than 10 years.

Jagmohan’s journey began with karate training in 1987 under Gurpreet Rozi, a coach in Kapurthala. He made Punjab proud by winning gold medal three times in a row at the National Karate Championships in Karad (Maharashtra), Surat (Gujarat) and Delhi in 1988, 1989 and 1990-91, respectively.

He passed the first degree black belt test in the International Belt Grading Test organised by Renshi Lee Kam Kwan in Hong Kong in 1991.

In 1994, he led the Indian team to the International Modern Arnis Training seminar in Philippines and obtained the licence of the first Modern Arnis trainer of north India. He started training children at Jagmohan Institute of Traditional Karate (JITK). Due to his efforts, the Punjab team emerged overall champion at the National Karate Championship three times in a row in 1994, 1995 and 1996.

He led the Indian team to the International Karate Competition held in Kathmandu in 1995 and the Kata and Kumite competition organised by Traditional Karate International in Las Vegas, US, in 1996. Jagmohan, who had passed the third degree black belt examination in Guju Ryu, was hired by the Punjab Armed Police to train its recruits. He was declared Punjab’s ‘Best Karate Coach’ by the Punjab Amateur Karate Do Association for seven consecutive years from 1991 to 1997.

In 1998, he took training from Shihan Morio Higaonna, world famous karate coach of Goju Do in San Diego, US, and passed the fourth degree black belt examination from the International Society of Okinawan/Japanese Karate.

In 2001, due to some personal reasons Jagmohan closed his academies in Punjab and Himachal and limited himself to personal training.

In 2012, Jagmohan started training youths again. By the time, the rules of karate training and competitions had changed a lot. Starting from scratch, Jagmohan failed in the National Referee exam in May 2014. But the failure ignited a spark in him. After six months, he passed the certified coach test from the national federation during the Senior National Championship. In 2015, he passed the national referee ‘A’ exam and became the first referee ‘A’ from Punjab. Uttarakhand Karate general secretary Sanjeev Kumar Jangra asked Jagmohan to focus on his refereeing career. Seeing his passion for refereeing, National Karate Federation general secretary Shihan Bharat Sharma selected him for the referee/judge examination organised by the Asian Karate Federation (AKF) and in September 2016 he became the first AKF judge from the region. In 2019, he cleared the World Karate Federation (WKF) judge’s exam in Dubai in his first attempt.

In 2022, Jagmohan Vij became the WKF Judge ‘A’ by clearing an exam organised by the World Karate Federation in Turkey. In October 2024, he cleared the WKF referee upgrade exam.