Paramita Bhattacharya, class 12 student who secured Gold at TAFISA aims for Olympics
Our girls keep doing us proud and bring one Gold medal after another from international meets. This time it is Paramita Bhattacharya of Birbhum, West Bengal. We won’t be surprised if you find yourself unaware of her exemplary feats. The class 12 student from the remote corners of Bengal is a resident of Bolpur, Shantiniketan who competed in a dozen events, and faced representatives from Brazil and Thailand, to bring home gold from the ring of TAFISA World Martial Arts Festival in Ulyanovsk, Russia held between 14th to 17th of September. Paramita had contested in the U-18 category for girls and secured the gold medal after defeating her competitor from Indonesia.
The festival was aimed at celebrating the diversity and benefits Martial Arts brings to the society, and delegations from across countries were present to showcase their Martial Arts skills to over 20,000 spectators. The occasion was marked by performances, clinics, demonstrations, master classes and several other connected events.
The international victory of their golden girl swells the hearts of Bolpur locals with pride, who have bestowed Paramita with the title of Carat Girl, understandably, derived from the expression ‘22 carat gold’.
Apparently, this is not the first time for Paramita to have tasted success. According to her trainer Kausabh Sanyal, she has been victorious at numerous local competitions and have won medals and recognition in several district, state and national level tournaments. The Martial arts champ from Birbhum qualified to attend the international affair in Russia after hitting gold at the Manipur Jeet Kune Do event held in 2018.
Qualifying for the event, however, didn’t make things easier for her. Hailing from a middle-class family of limited means, it was quite the taxing task for her family to make arrangements to send her to Russia. Won’t be an exaggeration if we said, her father, Kamdev Bhattachraya had to burn the midnight oil to add up finances for his daughter’s international flight and stay. He struggled to the fullest of his capacities and realized his daughter’s dream, anyhow.
What makes Paramita’s a more inspiring story is how, cutting through all these challenges, she finally reached her destination, and in the very first attempt returned home with a gold medal. The daunting financial barriers couldn’t pin her down.
As reports suggest, Paramita has always been a woman of unwavering determination and valiant temperament. She made headlines last year by warding off bike-borne miscreants who were harassing her classmate, and turned them black and blue with a rain of karate kicks and punches. This was how her skills first came to light. She has also been practicing Shotokan Karate and earned her black belt last year.
“That is when I realized she is destined to go places,” remarked her trainer recalling the infamous incident. After witnessing her victory at the international showground, one of her firsts, Paramita’s trainer now aims for greater heights and is training her to compete at bigger tournaments. “It was a dream for me to show my skills on an international stage. My dream is now to prepare myself for the Olympics” shares the young champ who has channeled all her efforts and hard work towards achieving her newly-found goal.
The way we look at it, it is not her winning the gold medal at TAFISA, but the story of her encounter with the eve-teasers and how she took them to task, that must act as a motivation for all parents to sign their little girls up for self-defense trainings. Self-defense has become an indispensable skill to acquire in the age we are living in. There are perpetrators everywhere – outside the four walls of safety, and inside. Self-sufficiency of a girl or a woman alone will come in handy because there’s only so much guarding a guardian or the government can promise or provide.
