Kolkata duo’s film sheds light on a blind boxer’s dreams – Times of India

Kolkata News

KOLKATA: A 17-year-old from Maharashtra’s Beed has made a name for himself in a film on boxing. Shabir Sheikh, who lost his sight due to an infection, has now acted in a film which is perhaps India’s first movie on boxing where a visually impaired actor has played a blind boxer. Sheikh was trained in boxing so he could face the camera for engineers-turned-filmmakers Bijoy Banerjee and Kaushik Mondal’s film ‘Ali -The Blind Boxer’.
“Boxing is considered to be an exclusive privilege of the sighted. There’s no place for a blind person in this sport, not even in para-Olympics. Surprisingly, other contact sports like judo and taekwondo are included in the para-Olympics,” said Banerjee. “We wanted to understand if this is just a mindset issue or a technical impossibility,” said Mondal, an electronics engineer from IIT-Kharagpur. Their hour-long film was born with the intention of carrying out a “reality check” on this.
However, films on blind boxers are not uncommon internationally. Arne Totz’s ‘Dear Enemy: The Journey of Bashir’ explores the unique journey of blind boxer Bashir Ramathan in Uganda. Cheung Sum’s ‘Blind Boxer’ is about how a visually impaired boxer defends himself against crooked promoters. But ‘Ali -The Blind Boxer’ is different from such projects because it is more of a social experiment.
“In our film, when the coach is shown researching on blind boxing, he watches Ramathan’s YouTube clip,” said Banerjee, a civil engineer from Jadav-pur University.
Casting for the film wasn’t easy since the makers were clear that the objective couldn’t be achieved if the lead was played by a sighted actor. When the directors spotted their lead at the Pune Blind School, Sheikh was in Class X. The other members of the cast were also non-actors with most facing the camera for the first time while shooting this film. For four months, international body building champion and trainer Aakash Awate, national level boxing champion Tejashre Bhame and Maharashtra state-level boxing champion Sahil Waghmare trained Sheikh in boxing and fitness.
“For a sighted boxer, it’s natural to think that I can be easily knocked out. But to knock me out, they need to come very close. That’s when I strike. I know that I’ll get hit and I’ve trained to absorb punches. But I’ve trained to punch back too. Being blind does not make me a sitting duck inside the ring,” Sheikh said.
Making this film wouldn’t have been possible without the support of Sheikh’s family. When Sheikh injured his lip while boxing with a sighted opponent, the directors had wanted to stop shooting. But both Sheikh and his father would have none of that. “After watching him box in real life with a champion sighted boxer, a coach in Pune has pledged to train him. With proper support, he may become India’s first blind boxer,” Banerjee said.
Having received accolades in the disability category at film festivals, the directors are hoping that this movie will be an inspiration for people with disabilities and show them they are no less than anybody else.

Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/kol-duos-film-sheds-light-on-a-blind-boxers-dreams/articleshow/80605738.cms