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KOTTAYAM: Whoever thinks muscle bikes are a boy thing hasn’t seen Diya Joseph crank up a 350cc beast through the scenic Kottayam-Kanjirapally route in her native Kerala. Villagers often stop in their tracks at the sight of the wispy 21-year-old vrooming past them on a 200kg Thunderbird, but that’s not what makes this engineering student special.
Diya’s expertise as a bike mechanic far exceeds her skill as a hobby biker.Bike manufacturer Enfield has hailed her as the country’s “youngest professional mechanic of 350cc engines”.
In a loose, oil-smeared tee with “Superman” emblazoned on it, Diya feels happiest repairing or fine-tuning a bike in her father Joseph Dominique’s Kottayam workshop.
She’s been learning the ropes since she was 10, starting off by noting down customer complaints at the workshop before graduating to helping her father with the nuts and bolts of the job.
“As a teenager, when girls my age would spend weekends and vacations having fun, I would invariably be with my father in his workshop,’ she said.
It was during the pandemic that Diya came into her own as a mechanic. As she grew in confidence, Dominique let his daughter handle even complicated repairs.
Even after joining a mechanical engineering course at Amal Jyothi Engineering College in Kanjirapally, Diya makes it a point to be at home during vacations so that she can co-manage the workshop.
On whether she plans to take up the job offer she already has from a prominent bike company’s factory in Chennai, Diya says she still has a long way to go before becoming an expert.



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