Kalaripayattu, widely regarded as among the oldest surviving martial arts traditions of India, is trained in the kalari, a sunken, earthen floored practice pit that functions simultaneously as a training ground and as a consecrated religious space, its layout, orientation and construction following prescribed rules that place it closer in kind to a small temple than to a secular gymnasium. The puttara, a stepped platform within the kalari, holds the presiding deity of the training space, most commonly a form of the goddess, and training sessions traditionally open with salutations offered to this deity and to the kalari's guardian spirits before any physical instruction begins, a devotional opening structurally similar to the wai khru of Thai boxing or the reverence shown a dojo in several East Asian martial traditions, though the Kerala theological content and the specific deities invoked are distinctly local.
The gurukkal, the martial teacher, holds an authority within this system that extends well beyond ordinary athletic instruction, since kalaripayattu training traditionally combines the martial curriculum, unarmed combat, weapons work and characteristic low, flowing body postures, with instruction in marma, the vital points of the body, and in the therapeutic knowledge needed to treat the injuries training itself produces.