Female MMA Athletes in Pakistan

Pakistan’s first female MMA athlete Anita Karim first stole the spotlight back in 2018 when she decided that this was the career path she wanted to walk down on. Now, the country can’t stop praising her for an unbelievable win against her Australian counterpart in Thailand at the Lumpinee Stadium.

Hailing from Hunza, 25-year-old Anita has always been a fighter since she was a young girl. She first enrolled in Taekwondo classes with her brothers. In 2019, after training for almost one year, the super puncher only took 5-seconds to take down her experienced opponent Gita Suharsono in One Warrior Series (OWS). Since then, Anita Karim has been given the title of the ‘arm collector’.

With support from her brother and other male practitioners of martial arts under the supervision of the well-known trainer, Ehtisham Karim, she flourished and is now making waves.

Anita took it to Twitter to share the news of the commendable victory that has made us a very proud nation.

Another one, Alhumdulillah 🇵🇰👊🏽♥️
All praises to the Almighty☝🏽and a big thank you to everyone who showed love and support 🙏🏽
Huge shoutout to my team @fairtexofficial for the knowledge and pushing me every single day to get better! #teamfightfortress #anitakarim pic.twitter.com/E4R2dlt1Y1

— Anita Karim (@karimanitamma) June 12, 2022

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Her proud brother also took it to social media to share his sister’s amazing achievement. “Anita Karim getting another W after putting on a clinic today at Fairtex Fight Promotion in Bangkok, Thailand. P.s. Anita is the only female Pakistani (and one of the VERY FEW women in the WORLD) to have fought at the world-famous Lumpinee Stadium!,” he wrote.

@karimanitamma getting another W after putting on a clinic today at Fairtex Fight Promotion in Bangkok, Thailand.
P.s. Anita is the only female Pakistani (and one of the VERY FEW women in the WORLD) to have fought at the world famous Lumpinee Stadium!
🇵🇰☝🏽 pic.twitter.com/QlLVwF6Ovd

— Uloomi Karim (@uloomi) June 11, 2022

Surprisingly, Anita doesn’t think MMA is a difficult career choice, however, the real challenge that she has to put up with is social pressure. “The time I decided to go for MMA, I called up my father and told him that I am going to cut my hair and take a break from studies to train for MMA fights. My mother and father were reluctant to allow me, but when they saw the passion I had for MMA, they relented,” she said. “The real hurdle began after that.”

“The time I cut my hair and dedicated myself completely to the MMA, people back home started talking about how I’m not doing the type of work that ‘normal’ women do. They criticised me a lot on my appearance and [for] the path that I took. Unfortunately, this is why many female fighters give up; just because they face pressure from society. I was lucky that I had a supportive brother, and he asked me to ignore everything and just focus on my training and ambition.”