KOing differences!

Harjit Singh, affectionately known as Bunny sir amongst his students, has taken up the onus of giving Karate lessons to hearing and speech impaired students from Rangnathan School in Vidyanagar.

Singh has been religiously devoting time to the endeavour for years now. The Karate master is a second Dan Black Belt. He has also secured a bronze medal in a national level Karate competition. Currently, he runs seven karate coaching classes and also works as a sports teacher in S S English medium school in Vishrantwadi.  He has students ranging from tiny four-year-olds to 30-year-olds. "Teaching Karate to kids is a challenge. Their impressionable minds need to be moulded with care. Karate is all about physical and mental alertness. It needs a lot of concentration."

Hails from Punjab
Harjit Singh hails from Punjab but is born and brought up in Pune. Harjit says, "My first inspiration to learn karate was Jackie Chan. When I was young, English movie featuring Jackie Chan. Looking at his fights I started practising and this is how I started learning karate. Later on I joined an academy where Anil Patil taught me. The perfect karate education was started in 1992 and got my black belt in 1997."
Karate is Singh's first love. On being asked what prompted him to take up the challenge of teaching the art to the hearing and speech impaired students, Singh reveals, "I always wanted to serve the society on the basis of whatever I have learned. I started coaching these students in 2006 and till now, around 50 students have played till district level karate competition. I feel these students have a greater grasping power than normal students as they are very receptive towards whatever I teach them."

Standing for special students with karate
He further adds, "Another reason for teaching these students is to help them combat their insecurities, especially amongst the girls. In the event of trouble, these speech and hearing impaired girls would not be able to even raise an alarm and seek help. Therefore, I want to make these girls strong enough to fend for themselves. Today when I teach small children, I try to find out what I can learn from these kids. I have a dream to take my students till Olympic level."

Appreciated for his selfless service
Appreciating Singh's efforts, Prashant Kamble, Principal of Ranganathan School, said, "We are very grateful to Bunny sir for what he is doing for our school students. He has never asked for fees from a single student from our school. We are really proud of him and hope he continues training these kids as long as it's possible."
Singh says that karate has taught him many things like how to respect others, the discipline, the strength and patience which helps a person groom himself into an attractive personality. "If I was not teaching Karate, I would have been in the Indian Army. I would love to join the army any day," he smiles.

--Jyoti Nalawade