Jagmeet Singh is a Canadian politician who is leader of the federal New Democratic Party. He was the first turban-wearing Sikh to sit as a provincial legislator in Ontario, the first to lead a major federal party, as well as the first to hold a deputy leader position in Canada. Before entering politics, Singh was a lawyer.

His family moved to Windsor, Ont., when he was seven years old.

Learning to fight

Singh says he was bullied as a youngster and took up martial arts to defend himself, going on to captain his high school wrestling team and winning the Toronto championships in Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

Singh told GQ:

How did you get into fighting?

I got picked on a lot in school and got myself into a lot of fights. For self-confidence and probably for some self-defense, my parents put me into martial arts and I loved it. I found the discipline, training, body building, skill development, and just learning something new to be exciting. I started martial arts when I was about nine-years old and have been training in one form or another ever since. I started off with Taekwondo and some Akido. I did a lot of wrestling in high school. Later on I did traditional boxing and Muay Thai. I did a lot of striking, but my specialty was grappling so fighting around wrestling, Jiu Jitsu, and Judo was my main focus.

Hypothetically, do you think you can take on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in the ring?

Yes, definitely. Particularly if he did MMA—that’s my background so I could definitely take him on in that style. But my boxing is pretty solid, so I think I can definitely give him a run for his money.

In another interview with huffpo Singh said:

There was a lot of racism as a brown kid, with long hair and funny-sounding first name…. I got in a lot of fights all the time,” he recounted.

“Kids would say: ‘You’re dirty, your skin is dirty, why don’t you take a shower’ … or ‘You’re not a boy, you’re a girl because you have long hair,’ and then they would just come up and pull my hair, or just punch me.”

Singh later became captain of his high school wrestling team and won the scholar athlete award. Between 2003 and 2007, he was the GTA’s undefeated champion for his weight class in submission grappling.

“That makes you less of a target when you are very sure of yourself,” he said. “I tried to carry myself very confidently and I had to try to develop this mentality that people are going to stare at me, they are going to look at me, so I better give them something to look at.”

Canada’s Jagmeet Singh became first non-white politician to lead major party in the past few days.