History [Birth Place of Mallkhamb] [Birth Place of Shri Balambhattdada]

MALLAKHAMB is not really an ancient sport.
Some researchers think that references of Mallakhamb are there even in the history of 12th century. Veda is a pure Indian ancient authentic references even followed today. "Manasolhas" & "Manusmruti" are the 2 authentic books still refereed by many scholars. According to both of them, Mallakhamb that according to these researchers, there termed, as "Mallastambha" is a part of one of the most advanced apparatus used to build up the physique.

But the fact is that "Mallastambha" was in fact the Metallic mainly Iron Pole or Stambha with the help of which Mallas (Wrestlers) used to exercise, some times even like weight training exercises were performed on Mallastambha!
The authority in Veda "" Dr. Aniruddha D. Joshi", confidently clarifies that 'Mallastambha and Mallakhamb are totally different sport". Apparatus. According to authentic references, the origin of Mallakhamb was somewhere in the beginning of 19th century. There was a beautiful story behind the origin of Mallakhamb...

Around 250 years ago when Indian soil was ruled by many different foreign intruders, there were few defenders, in form of Rulers who in their respective kingdoms not only protecting the rights of people but also protecting & developing the culture of them.

In Maharashtra, Peshwas were the rulers with Pune as their capital. Peshwas were having good developed juridical systems at the same time; they were encouraging various cultural activities & arts. Wrestling was one of the famous demonstrative arts of that time.

Many top class wrestlers throughout the country occasionally visit Pune to show their skills. Generally Peshwas had the top class players & hence there was hardly any time the Peshwa Darbar (Kingdome) lost in the fight.

On the eve of 17th century amongst the team of top class wrestlers was Sir Balambhatdada Deodhar. He was a very educated, scholar of Veda's at the same time a very strong amateur wrestler. On one occasion he had defeated an opponent who had given a challenge to their coach Sir Raghoba Vastad. From that time he was deputed to coach Peshwa himself or herself

During the same course of time, two top class wrestlers named Alli & Gulab" visited Pune after conquering the entire Hindustan. They put a challenge to Peshwa Darbar for wrestling. Both were heavily weighted & fully professionals. By looking at their physique & past performances, no body from the Peshwe Darbar stood up for the competition. When Sir Balambhatdada got this information, he rushed to Darbar & demanded the permission of Peshwas for the fight. Peshwa agreed to it.
As Sir Balambhatdada was not in a regular touch of Professional wrestling, he also requested some time for the fight. Then he went to a lonely & holy place near to Nashik district named Vani.

This is the famous holy place where goddess "Saptashrugi" was beautifully sculptured in stone. People believe that the goddess herself remained there inform of statue. At that holy & lonely Forrest place Sir Balambhatdada discovered the power of Mallastambha & he also by observing difficult maneuvers performed by Monkeys on trees, successfully introduced the same kind of exercises on the wooden pole. Thus Sir Balambhatdada not only discovered the New Instrument for body development, but also prepared the new system of training of course for wrestling.

After gaining lot of confidence & strength, Sir Balambhatdada returned to Pune & defeated the challenger Alli. Due to a very poor defeat of colleague, Gulab refuses to fight & thus Sir Balambhatdada became the outright winner.
Later on by personal experience & also by the experiences of his students, Sir Balambhatdada devoted his full life in spreading of this new sport apparatus throughout the country. The details of the spread up of the sport are provided in form of a chart.

Opponent / Partner. Latter on the game has diversified from wrestling to shine its own identity. Introduction of various acrobatic elements added more risk.

ORIGIN

In the Mallakhamb history, two places mentioned prominently are Saptashringi & Kothure. Saptashringi at Wani. Nashik is the birthplace of Mallakhamb & Kothure is the birthplace of founder of Mallakhamb SirBalambhattDada Deodhar....

Both these place, even today are very peaceful & really 'Untouched' by the perversed modernisation. It is really worth to visit them once in a life.