Swiss self defence expert on India tour for training women

New Delhi, Dec 1: A Swiss self defence expert Martial Vout, who manages secirity of VIPs and politicos globally, says self-defence tricks need not require any special kick-boxing training or a muscular body.

"These techniques are basic and natural, and are in fact inspired from the way kids and animals react at situations of fight or war," he said, adding that 90 per cent of attacks on women are done by known ones.

"There is a misconception that across certain socio-economic strata, incidents of attack will not happen to them, and certainly not from known members. The recent honour killings of the girl from a well-reputed college of the city just shows that this is still the case and the biggest challenge for me has been to get women to acknowledge that and empower themselves," said Vout.

Training is the easier part as his methods are based on a women's instinctive reactions. Vout, who is on India tour, also recently launched his self-defence book for women, "I Can Defend Myself" by conducting a self-defence workshop for women.

"The aim of the workshop and the book is to encourage women to be able to use their basic skills and instincts to defend themselves and to do away with misconceptions that you need to be muscular or to run hard to get away from such cornered situations," said Vout.

Vout, who has lived in Switzerland and worked extensively in the European Union and Israel, landed in India 6 months back to study the scenario of women in metros, to empower them with psychological and physical skills to defend themselves, and in the course of time, has penned this book which has both descriptive and diagrammatic information.

Martial worked with a group of women demonstrating the various situations in which a woman can get trapped and simple ways to tackle them.

PTI