Sergei Stroitelev

Photographer

stroitelev.visura.co/

Where the Champions Are Born

Follow Hire

Where the Champions are Born
New Delhi (India), 2017

Kushti is a modern wrestling, similar in a number of techniques to European freestyle wrestling. In the 17th century, it gained wide popularity in India, but after the colonization of the country by the British, it lost its significance.

A Kushti revival occurred in the early 20th century in the Indian state of Haryana. Naturally, the metropolis of New Delhi has become a kind of center for the cultivation of this sport. The first kushti academy in the city became Guru Hanuman Akara. The academy bears the name of its founder, an outstanding Indian kushti trainer, which was opened in 1925 in the northern region of Delhi - Shakti Nagar. The training section of the academy covers approximately 200 square meters and includes a training room with mats and a mud wrestling area, a kitchen and outdoor showers. The athletes themselves live nearby in rather ascetic conditions.

The entire academy complex is called Akara. Wrestlers live and train here for years without leaving its walls. The higher the status of Akara, the more difficult it is to get into it, respectively, only the strongest young men get into Guru Hanuman. Another necessary quality is an unbridled desire to train and succeed, despite all sorts of hardships.