Silver Jubilee Of Indian National Football League

Pic - :: The National I-League Trophy

National Football League

It was in the year 1996 some 21 years ago that the I-League was first thought about and a lot of discussions took place amongst the top notch football head and the brasses of the A I F F of this country The reason and the explanation cited was how to bring about a complete change of mindset and PFOFESSIONALISM to this game in the country

Indian football had already started sinking and the clubs also were finding the bearings very very hard to cope up. Especially the Kolkatta clubs had started finding that it was not easy to maintain the club as the expenditures were mounting and the clubs were finding it increasingly very hard to garner the revenue to maintain themselves.

Thereafter it was also revealed that the status and the standard of the players and their standard of living also did not approve . Professionalism and the cash were scants and the players of football too remained poor . The two clubs from Kolkatta East Bengal and the one from Punjab J C T to some extent saw to it that the players of their clubs were paid something that would make the lovers to football to feel that penury was not the case in toto in Indian football but that money was also for some of them, a few who could be counted on the finger tips The rest were all made to play because they had to play and LOVE the club A lot like Pintu Chowdhury and Surojit Sengupta hardly earned anything from football but if you have to take their contribution to football it would send you rubbing your eye with wonder

Standard wise too Indian football had sunken and sulked below. We at and in 1996 were placed 157 out of a total of 197 countries playing football. It went down further to 167 in 2002 out of the 207 nation playing football This did not augur well for football Again the quality of the players those started coming into the game also deteriorated We did have a Carlton Chapman, a Baichung Bhutia, I I M Vijayan or a Joe Paul Ancheri to say but as compared the other countries in Asia say Kuwait and Korea had as many as six to seven footballers in each position in their teams to select for if compared to our players

The coffers of the A I F F too had shrined and it never had the kind of the money to send the footballers to abroad either for match experience, exposure or training . That also hindered Indian football As compared the Petro dollars nation and its standard rose up by leaps and bound Say for example Kazma a top very top football club from Kuwait had come here to participate in the I F A Sheild in 1978 They had lost to Aryans by 1-0, Debashish Roy being the scorer for Aryans. In 1990 Kazma became the champion club of Asia by defeating Daewoo Korea by 3-1 and Aryans was not there at all in Indian football . The other countries made rapid stride in football and the club football as well as its scheming structure to produce football changed like anything but we were no where in the scene. A lot of clubs like Mafatlal , Gorkha Brigade , Hyderabad Police, Tata Football Club to name a few were not there in the text book and the map of Indian football World wise the number of clubs in the other countries were expanding and here our all the named and the famed clubs were going away with the wind .

Where was Chandra Memorial , Behala Youth , Shimla Youngs, in 1992 or where was Harwood League played at Bombay It was all gone ? Where was Leaders Club, Jullundur or Rajasthan Armed Constabulary in 1992 Leaders was disbanded in 1978 and R A C was in 1979 and that was that

To revive the Indian football and to structure the existing clubs, to make them viable financially and to strengthen their backbone it was decided to change the concept of football in India and also to make it professional In India during that time professionalism in football meant playing for your club for a peanut and totally depending on the monthly salary that came out of the job. If you were injured and if that injury took away the game for you you would have to fend for yourself . The example of Kosalram in 1974 and Ashok Chanda in 1978 comes in as a handy as well Kosalram had to somehow do a job of Central Railways at Bombay before breathing his last and Ashok Chanda has to fall back on the Bank Of India’s job at Kolkatta which he is still doing it with those like Manoranjan Bhattacharjee, Mihir Bose who had joined those Bank with him

It was taken into account that the inception of the I-League would be such that if a footballer plays in these league for say about an decade he would not have to work at all for the rest of his life That being in mind it was also decided that the quality of the game of football and its standard in India and the standard of the game would be raised to such a level that people would flock at the stadium to see the matches that most of the clubs played at India

The number of the attendance of the local football league matches has sunk.I was at the East Bengal ground in 1985 to watch three matches that East Bengal played that year against Aryans, Tollygounge Aggragami and Behala Youth and all the three matches saw the East Bengal ground full to its capacity Not even a single square inch of the space was available to take a seat But the same ground was empty when I visited last in 2006 at Kolkatta Nobody wishes to watch the football matches these days going to the ground now That itself speaks the condition and the reason for thr gate collection falling to the lowest ebbs

Indian football at one stage was such that any Indian team could defeat any day any of the best of the African team and that was reflected in 1987 when East Bengal defeated an Olympic team of Nigeria by 3-1 in the I F A Shield with Bikas Panji, Sudeep Chatterjee and Ranjit Karmakar scoring. But in 1990 the same Nigerian team with the addition of Roger Milla qualified for the World Cup in 1990 beating Argentina by 1-0 in their first game and the least we talk about Indian football the better

Hence it was decided that strong good foreigners also would be given a chance to compete and play in Indian football so that our players do not rub their shoulders with the best against the foreigners but gain maximum experience while laying against them

Foreigners in Indian football were not an unusual entities but a priority .This was an attempt to make it a NECCESSITY. We had seen Majid Bhaskar , Jamshid Nassiri , and the likes of Chima Okerie and them playing in India but they were few and a little which did not serve the need of Indian football. Of course the three made and left an incredible mark in the annals of Indian football.

Inviting good sponsor for the game, selling the rights of the game to the channels for telecast, pooling in the revenue from the channels, increasing viewership, creating a fan base overall for the Indian football, spreading the game in an manner to the nooks and the corner of the country , giving chance to good and qualitative footballers from abroad to play here at India, bringing in good coach from abroad to train the club footballers , and exchanging the trips abroad for the Indian footballers to train and play with the best of the teams abroad was the ONE POINT AGENDA of conducting and bringing the professionalism by introducing the I-League/the National League .

This is how the professionalism the I-League and its concept was mooted and introduced here at India and this is how the game changed its course at India The first of the I-League/National Football League started at 1996 and it has been over 25 years that this game is in progress

Some of the salient features in terms of the records etc are not being put here as I do not consider those being put here for anything good .

Well , that is it and That sums it all.

Regards and Thanks

Pics

Shyamal Bhattacharjee 

Mr Shyamal Bhattacharjee, the author was born at West Chirimiri Colliery at District Surguja, Chattisgarh on July 6th 1959 He received his early education at Carmel Convent School Bishrampur and later at Christ Church Boys' Higher Secondary School at Jabalpur. He later joined Hislop College at Nagpur and completed his graduation in Science and he also added a degree in    B A thereafter. He joined the HITAVADA, a leading dailies of Central India at Nagpur as a      Sub-Editor ( Sports ) but gave up to complete his MBA in 1984 He thereafter added a Diploma In Export Management. He has authored THREE books namely Notable Quotes and Noble Thought published by Pustak Mahal in 2001 Indian Cricket : Faces That Changed It  published by Manas Publications in 2009 and Essential Of Office Management published by NBCA, Kolkatta  in 2012. He has a experience of about 35 years in Marketing .

Signature Of Shyamal Bhattacharjee 

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