Ishita Malaviya

Career

Malaviya began surfing in 2007 after meeting a German exchange student. She currently runs a surf club named the Shaka Surf Club as well as a camp called Camp Namaloha in Coastal Karnataka in India.

Malaviya, along with her high school friend and boyfriend Tushar Pathiyan, run the surf club from the village of Kodi Bengre, located on the Konkan Coast. As of 2014, she is the only Indian to be appointed as a brand ambassador for Roxy surfwear.

Malaviya has stated that her ambition is to promote the Indian coastline as an international surfing destination.

She was also sponsored by sporting brand Quiksilver and was part of the first Summer Swell Challenge, a surfing challenge held in Pondicherry, India.

Films

In 2014, the surf club uploaded a video titled The India Surf Story. It was a thirteen-minute-long documentary about the origins of surfing in India. Most of the footage for the video was shot at the India Surf Festival held in 2013 at Odisha. The film took shape over a period of eight months and was made with a small budget using borrowed equipment and volunteer effort.

In 2014, a documentary film titled Beyond The Surface, was made, based on the life of Malaviya and other female surfers. Another documentary chronicling the life of Malaviya was co-made by the groups Storytellers for Good and the Brown Girls Surf.

Personal life

Malaviya was born in Bombay (now Mumbai) and studied journalism at Manipal University, Manipal. At the age of 22, she moved to Manipal, Karnataka permanently to start her surfing club, The Shaka Surf Club.