In the wee hours of tomorrow, the 21st of June 2017, for the first time in history, the Indian sport of Mallakhamb will be demonstrated in the premises of the United Nations.
The event will be streamed live on Youtube, the link for which is here. The first performance of the event will be Mallakhamb and it will run for 15 minutes. The performance is scheduled to start at 3 am IST.
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The International Yoga Day is organised by Permanent Mission of India to the United Nations, under the leadership of Ambassador Syed Akbaruddin. The Mallakhamb Federation will perform Rope and Pole demonstrations individually and in group pyramids. The Federation will also let other participants try out Mallakhamb during the event.
As one of India’s traditional sports carrying the nation’s flag in foreign shores, it is a proud achievement for Mallakhamb to showcase itself in front of the United Nations. To help continue the sport’s rise, the Mallakhamb Federation USA needs more students, volunteers, and coaches more instead of monetary help, especially the people from Indian diaspora living in the United States of America.
Mallakhamb Federation USA
Mallakhamb Federation USA was started in 2015 in Chinmay Sunil Patankar and Pradnya Chinmay Patankar’s residence garage in Edison, New Jersey. The Federation was founded by Rajesh Narkhede, Manali Bhole, Indraneel Soparkar, and Omkar Deshpande.
The Federation has filed for not-for-profit certification, which is currently under consideration by local authorities. Coaches, volunteers (Manjunath Neraneki, Shreyas Daripkar, Vikas Sangam, Mahesh Wani), and officials (Rahul Joshi, Prabhakar Nagireddy) do not earn a salary for working for the Federation. The Federation has also set a target of setting up one training centre in every state of America by the end of 2020.
The Federation has been running centres in New Jersey (Chinmay Patankar, Pradnya Patnakar), Michigan (Ameet Yadav, Siddhartha Waichal, Ruchi Choksi) and California (Ruby Karen, Luca Cecchini). Discussions are ongoing to start training centres in New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Kansas.
Furthermore, to strike the American psyche and attract more American youths, the Federation has also designed a systematic curriculum. Pole Mallakhamb has five levels and Rope Mallakhamb has four levels. The curriculum is divided into five sets of skills mounts, acrobatic elements, intercepts, yoga positions, and dismounts.
New Jersey Mallakhamb Center
The New Jersey Center is the first centre to start Mallakhamb in the USA. The New Jersey Center is also the leading Federation administration, certification and training workshops. Currently, the New Jersey Center is run by Chinmay Sunil Patankar and Pradnya. Chinmay is a Shiv Chatrapati Award winner and has won numerous national championships.
Pradnya has been teaching Rope Mallakhamb for many years. Training classes are run for kids and followed by adult fitness training. The centre conducts various workshops and teacher’s certification camps throughout the calendar year. In fact, when temperatures are below zero degree Celsius and roads are covered by snow, training on Sunday’s continue. The training centre is blessed by very cooperative parents participating in training, administration, financial management, transporting equipment, and, nonetheless, creating memories.
