Fitness Industry: Perched For A Soaring Take-off In India

When discussions were underway about doing away with the bikini or swimsuit round at Miss World pageant which has a long standing history, the voices that welcomed the decision probably outnumbered the ones who saw some significance in it. This was the first time in the history of the pageant that is being organised since little over half a century that a constructive decision to ‘modernize’ the competition was being taken.

When one considers how much skin show is required to flaunt a fit body, the answer isn’t always promisingly positive. The more skin show, the better. In that sense, this decision must be some sort of a moribund if we would like to view it with a narrow perspective?

Some of the former beauty queens including the most famous Aishwarya Rai welcomed the decision. Elaborating further, she said she entered the pageant she wasn’t all that good as far as owning a beach body was concerned. “I didn’t have a perfect beach body, but I managed to win on overall basis,” she said in her response to the decision taken by Morleys, the organisers of Miss World pageant.

There are many reasons as to why Indians, male or female, cannot have a perfect beach body by international standards. It is in the very Indian DNA that people here are heavy and curvaceous, stout and short built and really distinct in their body types. But, in the recent times, people are also working hard towards changing a few things about the way they are made. And, no, they aren’t going under the scalpel for that.

More and more Indians are hitting the gym every year. The industry, which probably belonged to the elite and select few many decades ago, has now consumed the middle class and entered fringe villages which are on the periphery of urbanization.

Today, fitness industry accounts to over $24 billion franchise industry which is waiting to be expanded and exploited to achieve the complete potential.

In the last decade or so, Indian fitness industry has come a long way from being a non-existent upper middle class dominated industry that only reached a certain category of people. In the recent years, the middle class with its highly disposable income and newfound consciousness about health is now working hard to keep predominant health conditions at bay.

Diabetes, cardiac problems, osteoporosis, arthritis are common among Indians who are rushing to occupy the world’s number one slot in many health conditions that invariably become a part of their existence by the time they enter the post-40 lifespan.

Fitness industry isn’t banking on this newly dawned realisation alone. It is also working on ensuring Indians realize the importance of ‘looking good, eating right and feeling good’.

Earlier, it was only sports persons who endorsed directly or indirectly, the importance of fitness. Today that isn’t the case. Fitness has as many champions today in various fields. Fitness is considered to be the lone solution for so many psychological and physiological problems that medical intervention can be minimized by just hitting the gym alone. The middle class has now latched on to it.

Among the first few gyms in the country, which have now gone on to create a niche segment for self is Talwalkars, VLCC, Golds etc must have been pretty stumped at the idea of having to sell punishment as a lifestyle to people. But, decades later, the fruits have paid off. These brands are not only the leaders in the segment, but also sole drivers of this economy that is bound to see brighter days ahead.

The market of fitness is still in its nascent stages today, with a lot of potential to see an unabated growth in the coming years. Obsession with great bodies has now turned into an equal sport for both men and women.

Though there is not much of a visible disparity, commodification of fitness is as much as pornografication of a beach body too. Fitness today is a product that is packaged and sold in gyms with the promise of reaching a perfect body with constant workout.

This is exactly where the experts come in to warn against setting up unrealistic expectations. It is okay to desire to have a body that’s perfect and aim at it, but it’s altogether another factor to obsess over a photoshopped picture that shows an unrealistic body that cannot be achieved. The message is somehow going missing while the crucial aspects about fitness are being shared by nutritionists and doctors.

Fitness Industry, according to experts, holds only 8% of the total wellness industry’s share with ample space to grow and coexist. The industry is anticipated to grow at a good 20% every year, with some prominent international brands making headway into the country.

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