Bend it like Vikanksha: This 12-year-old Delhi girl is a yoga teacher

At the age of four when other children wouldn’t have even known what yoga is, Vikanksha Pandita had mastered some of the most difficult asanas.

At the age of four when other children wouldn’t have even known what yoga is, Vikanksha Pandita had mastered some of the most difficult asanas.

Pandita, 12, started yoga inspired by her father, a retired army professional.

“Seeing me practice yoga asanas, my daughter tried some of them, and I was stunned to see the unusual flexibility in the body of a four-year-old,” said Vikanksha’s father Vinod Ji Pandita.

Vikanksha’s mother Sunita Pandita, a school teacher, had more than a dozen students coming to her for tuitions. The 12-year-old initially started giving them yoga tips which the children used to practice back home. Seeing the health benefits, the children started demanding regular yoga classes from her.

She was impressed to see the enthusiasm among the children and started giving them regular sessions. She was just five years then.

Currently, she teaches yoga to around 12 children on Saturday and Sunday for which she doesn’t charge anything. She is often invited by yoga clubs to show her skills and give speeches.

Several yoga clubs have also contacted her parents asking them to allow Vikanksha take classes but they don’t want to overburden their child.

“She is too small to make this a profession and secondly, she has her studies, we don’t want to overburden her,” said her father Vinod Ji Pandita, who lives in Jain Nagar near Rohini.

The Class 8 student at Kendriya Vidyalaya in Rohini’s Sector 3 has won more than 20 medals in state-level yoga championships and other tournaments. She has also been awarded with the prestigious Bharat Yogya Rattan in 2013 by Rashtriya Kalyan Yogya Sanstha and has been awarded Miss Yogini title in 2014 by Delhi government.

Vikanksha’s coach Naveen Shastri Khandpal believes that she has the talent to be India’s face in yoga.

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