Tall, fair and pretty, Sonika Raman looks anything but a wrestler. But when Raman, 25, pins her younger brother to the mat, you know you are facing one tough woman: the recipient of “Mahila Bharat Kesri” award in the 75-kg category, the biggest achievement for women in the sport.

And her playground for the past 10 years is the 12x12-metre mat at Chandgi Ram akhada, the Capital’s only akhada for women in North Delhi. “I took up wrestling after finishing Class X. My father encouraged me to take it up since there was not much being done for women’s wrestling in the country,” says Raman, currently undergoing physiotherapy for spinal injury. “Now I want to fulfil my father’s ambition of India producing a champion woman wrestler.”

She and 14 other women train at the akhada under the watchful gaze of Padamshree Chandgi Ram, a 1970 Asian Games gold medallist in wrestling. But these days only a few are seen practising — some are either recovering from injury or are away at the 2010 Commonwealth Games camp in Patiala.

Raman says the average training day is broken into halves: three hours each in the morning and evening. The coach is a strict disciplinarian: “We do a 10-km jog, 100 push-ups, and then walk on our hands,” Raman, seniormost wrestler at the akhada, says.

After that comes wrestling — always on the mat, for this akhada does not allow wrestling on sand. “We hone our skills on mat since international wrestling is done on that,” Raman says.

Though not many in the country still associate the sport with women, wrestling was a conscious decision for many who joined the akhada. It was a “natural choice” for Sonu Verma, 20, from Bhiwani in Haryana, now made famous by the boxers. “My father was a professional wrestler, and since I was always a tomboy, he encouraged me to take up the sport,” says Verma, who participated in 2006 junior nationals in 52-kg freestyle.

Others like Panipat resident Rekha Kaliyan, 20, took up wrestling to face challenges. “My brother was a wrestler and seeing him pin opponents to the ground, I wondered whether I could do the same,” the bronze medallist at 2006 senior nationals (55kg freestyle) says.

Among the akhada’s illustrious trainees are Neha Rathi, 2007 Asian Championships winner, and Kavita Sharma, the bronze medallist at the same event.

Raman says wrestling gives respect incomparable to any other profession she could have opted for (she wanted to be a doctor): “It feels nice when parents come and tell me that I inspired them to put their daughter into wrestling. And it’s nice that they choose wrestling as a career for their daughters rather than, say, tennis.” While Raman is employed with MTNL, others, too, hope to get a stable government job some day.