History Of Budokan Karate

The International Budokan Karate Organization was founded in 1970.
Our beloved Grand master Chew Choo Soot founded this great institution in Australia.
This great man had a vision was to take a small karate family style in to a world leading karate federation. The following story is of our style from its early days in Australia to its modern ay presence all over the world in dozens of countries.

THE HISTORY OF KARATE - DO

It appears that an Indian monk namely Bodhidharma founded the early karate in the shaolin temple at Hunin at northern China in 520 A. D. Originally from India, this man travelled from India to the shaolin monks of China to teach Zen Meditation.

Ubfortunately this form of teahing was found physically unfit. Hence he created a new style called "Shih-pa-lo-han-sho." or THe eighteen hands of LoHan. It was repted as the early Kung Fu of China.

In the same place was born Master Chew Choo Soot on 7th of February 1922.

He became the Malaysian national weightlifting champion in 1939, 1940, 1941 and 1942. He was introduced to the art of “Karate-Do” at the age of twenty during the Japanese occupation of Malaysia.

Mr Chew made it on to the cover of a local publication and was contracted by a Japanese military officer to be his personal fitness coach. During one of the scheduled visits the young Mr Chew discovered the officer practicing movements, which we now know to be Kata, the styles practiced by the officer were Keishinkan and Shotokan. Mr chew was impressed and asked for tuition, the officer agreed. The founders of Karate Budokan International were Mr Chew, his sons Tony and Richard and daughter Angie, they studied a number of martial arts including chinese Kung fu, TaeKwonDo, and several styles of Karate-do including Shito-ryu, Shotokan and Keishinkan. Keishinkan is a minor style of the Shuri-te strain & is not widely known even in its country of birth. It comes from the line of Toyoma Sensei and the excellent qualities of its instructors are well known in Australia, Malaysia & elsewhere. With the parting of Keishinkan in 1971 there has been no over riding influences on our style. There was a trend in the mid 1980’s in our Kata development towards the Shotokan style. It must be understood that Karate is an ever-evolving art & KBI is no different in this respect. So from these humble beginnings in a neighbourhood Malaysian Dojo K B I was formed.

Sadly Mr Chew passed away on July 18th, 1997.
Our Grandmaster now is his son and heir Sensei Richard Chew and Shihan Wayne MacDonald is the International Chief instructor.
INDIA
India can rightly claim to have the largest K.B.I. membership in the world. More than 300,000 had received their training from more than 600 K.B.I. authorised instructors and assistant instructors in India it is, therefore, an undisputed fact that the Karate Budokan International is the largest and most active karate organisation in India and possibly in the World.
Just like any other large organisations in the world there are bound to be a few “rotten apples” in the barrel. A handful of instructors were misusing their position to cheat the members and public by issuing their own Black belt and Kyu-grade certificates, which were not worth the paper on which they were printed. Incidents of such nature were discovered in Bombay, Trichy, Mangalore, Bangalore, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh.