‘Raised as commandos’: Pakistani sisters brave ridicule, gender bias to pursue competitive weightlifting

LAHORE: As Shafaq Dar completes a barbell press and puts the weight back in its place, one of her coaches nods approvingly while all around, men take a pause from their training routines to watch.
The scene is from clips of Shafaq, 16, and her sister Khadija, 15, training at the Star Weightlifting Academy in the northeastern Pakistani city of Gujranwala, which have gone viral in the last week, turning the Dar sisters into overnight darlings of the media.
While such attention and encouragement are routine for top athletes, it is unusual for women from Gujranwala, a city that is famous for producing male wrestlers and great food but not female athletes.
But the girls’ father Waheed Dar, a former weightlifter himself, is resolved that no matter the gender biases and other obstacles, his daughters will carry forward his legacy and compete in international games. All his energies, now, are centered around training them for the South Asian Games in 2023.
“My daughters joined the Pakistan Weightlifting Federation in 2019 and they are now preparing for the National Championship scheduled for next month,” he told Arab News in an interview. “Their performance in the championship will pave the way to the South Asian Games where they are determined to get a gold medal.”
Dar said it took him some time to accept the idea that his daughters wanted to be weightlifters, which he had always considered a “men’s sport.”
“But later I surrendered when my daughters said if I had a son, I would never have said no to him,” Dar said, choking up with tears.
Dar was also inspired by a Bollywood film called Dangal, based on the true story of amateur Indian wrestler Mahavir Singh Phogat and his struggle to challenge gender stereotypes and turn his daughters Geeta and Babita into world-class fighters. Both are Commonwealth Games gold medalists.
The Phogats come from the northern Indian state of Haryana, which has among the worst gender ratios in the country and the highest incidences of violence against women. And while Gujranwala’s rankings on the status of women are not close to as bad and more and more women in the city are pursuing an education and jobs, there are very few training opportunities for girls who want to enter the sports industry. Social norms are also not in their favor.
Indeed, when the Dar sisters first began training, they were ridiculed by the community.
“We were not appreciated ... even our friends in schools disapproved of our choice to become weightlifters, rather we were degraded by them,” Khadija said in an interview. “Our neighbors mocked our mother that she didn’t do the right thing by allowing her daughters to become weightlifters.”
But both sisters say with their family’s support and blessing, they have learnt to ignore the criticism and have no doubt they can excel. They spend most of their time at the training center, doing workouts that include 50 snatch and 65 clean and jerk weightlifts collectively.
Khadija, weighing 59 kilograms, can lift 130kg in snatch and clean and jerk collectively, while Shafaq, who weighs 45kg, is doing 120kg in both snatch and clean and jerk routines.
“Let me tell you that we are not delicate,” Khadija said, laughing. “We have been raised as commandos.”
Muhammed Islam Natiq, the girls’ coach, is hopeful they will make their mark in the upcoming national championship and work their way to the Asian Games. However, he said the Pakistan Sports Board was not doing enough to promote new talent and the Pakistan Weightlifting Federation was low on funds.
“The Pakistan Sports Board provides only one million rupees (approximately $6,000) in funds annually which is nothing given the facilities required to train the athletes,” Natiq said. “The Federation requires three million rupees minimum to tap new talent and prepare young boys and girls for the world championship.”
“A properly constructed and implemented strength-training program,” he added, “can produce athletic performance but it needs a lot of money.”
Hafiz Imran Butt, the chief executive of the Pakistan Weightlifting Federation, agreed that a lack of funds was making it difficult for young athletes to perform in international competitions.
“The poor financial status of our athletes negatively impacts their performance,” he said. “Apart from that, lack of facilities and little international exposure also undermine their ability to compete in international tournaments.”
The director general of the Pakistan Sports Board Col. (r) Asif Zaman, however, said it was the responsibility of provincial authorities to financially support sports federations.
“The sports ministry has been devolved under the 18th Amendment, making these issues the responsibility of the federating units,” he said.
Zaman said a new policy formulated by the federal cabinet had made it mandatory for provinces to spend all allocated funds on their sports federations.
“If Punjab is getting Rs6 billion for sports, for instance, it will have to spend all that money to meet the requirements of all sports federations,” he explained.
The top PSB official said his own institution was taking care of top athletes like Olympians Talha Talib and Nadeem Arshad, and said it would offer elite training to the Dar sisters ahead of the South Asian Games if they outperformed others during the national championship next month.