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the inaugural Bino-ryu National Invitational Championships.
The competition, to be hosted by the Bino-ryu Karate Association of Zimbabwe, is slated for March 19 and 20 at the Belvedere Teachers’ Technical College in Harare.
S. Srinivasan is scheduled to arrive in Zimbabwe on March 16 accompanied by his wife Geeta.
The karate guru last paid a visit to Zimbabwe in April last year when he conferred the Zimbabwean Branch Chief of the karate style of bino-ryu, Jairos Manjoro, with the title of Shihan.
He then went on to conduct some training sessions for the local bino-ryu students.
The Indian instructor also conducted some self-defence and weapon handling courses for the local karatekas in Harare during his visit last year.
Manjoro said the main purpose of S. Srinivasan’s forthcoming visit to Zimbabwe is to grace the national invitational championships.
“The Grandmaster is arriving next week on Wednesday and will be staying in the country for 10 days.
“The main purpose of his visit is for him to grace the national invitational championships. He is also going to conduct some training sessions for the bino-ryu style.
“He is also going to conduct a self-defence training session for all styles and this was a request we put forward to him so that we can all learn and get some knowledge from him,” Manjoro said.
S. Srinivasan is also expected to upgrade local bino-ryu students during his visit.
Manjoro said the visit by the Indian Grandmaster shows that the sport is developing in Africa.
“I think the visit by the Grandmaster shows that there is growth in Zimbabwe’s karate. It also shows that international instructors are starting to appreciate our standards in Africa and it means a lot to have someone with the highest grading like S. Srinivasan coming to our country,” said Manjoro.
Meanwhile, the national invitational championships will feature other karate styles that are practiced in Zimbabwe and will cater for both the semi-contact and full-contact fighters. Some of the semi-contact styles that have confirmed their participation in this event include JSSK, shukokai kimura, dentokan, JKA shotokan and shitoryu while the full-contact style is made up of ashihara, extreme contact, kyokushin and bino-ryu.
However, Manjoro said the semi-contact and full-contact styles will have different bouts.
“We are having fighters from all provinces and all styles in Zimbabwe that is both semi-contact and full-contact but they will compete separately because the rules for the two styles are different. We are expecting about 200 fighters to take part in the competition and participants from outside Harare are expected to arrive on March 17,” said Manjoro.
Zimbabwe was given the green light to host their first edition of the national invitational championships last year during S. Srinivasan’s visit.