GREAT INDIA DRIVE
The second leg of our drive in the Hyundai Venue exploring India’s football culture
Leg two of the Hyundai Great India Drive takes us on a journey to better understand the game that
ties the North-East together
LET ME TELL YOU A STORY – ONE THAT IS LIGHT years away from the spectacle that was the India vs Bangladesh World Cup qualifier in Kolkata. It is an old story and details were hard to come by. I will take the help of an excerpt from an old newspaper clipping to set the stage.
“He tickled the crowd at Celtic Park on Friday with his magnificent ball manipulation. In his bare feet he was a conspicuous figure but this was further emphasised by his dark skin against the white and green of the Celtic strip. His play was top class. Every ball he touched went exactly to the place he wanted it to. His crosses into goal were simply shrieking to be nodded into the net,” wrote the Glasgow Observer on August 29, 1936.
The story begins a few years before, at the height of the Indian Freedom Struggle. A group of talented footballers yearned to get the better of the British in a game that the invaders had introduced to the masses – a sport that was thought to be beyond the Indians. The year was 1933 when a precocious talent had burst on to the scene at Mohammedan Sporting Club, now one of India’s bigger football clubs.
In his first full season (1934) in the senior team, he led Mohammedan SC to a championship victory in the Calcutta Football League (CFL) – the grandest of all leagues in India then. Two more season triumphs followed and Mohammedan SC seemed unstoppable.
The star of the turnaround however, was suddenly nowhere to be seen. News arrived in Indian Football’s offseason that Celtic FC in Scotland now had Mohammedan’s key player. Becoming the first player from the subcontinent to play for a European club, he caught the eye of the team bosses in Scotland as well as a club in Germany. It was a turnaround straight out of a fairy tale. An Indian footballer was in high demand in Europe! After only a
THE LANGUAGE, THE CULTURE AND EVEN THE TOPOGRAPHY WAS REMARKABLY
DIFFERENT
AWAY FROM THE GLITZ, GLAMOUR AND COMPETITIVENESS OF TOP-TIER FOOTBALL, THE KIDS
HERE MERELY WANT TO ENJOY THE GAME
handful of games, however, the star of Indian football felt homesick and decided to return home. However, he didn’t stop there and put in spirited performances to help his team in India lift the CFL cup in 1937 and 1938, making it five in a row. More importantly, he shut the door on the British in Indian football forever.
As we went about exploring Kolkata, and subsequently Guwahati in the Hyundai Venue Great India Drive, stories like these were often hidden by the unwavering spotlights shining down on the spectacles that are the ISL and the I-League. Things changed as we drove the Venue further East and large cosmopolitan cities were replaced by smaller ones, with mile-wide banners, and thundering crowds giving way to smaller groups of avid, more discerning fans.
We started off the second leg of our drive by visiting one of the many local football grounds in Guwahati. Players grouped by age were honing their craft even as the rains had taken a toll on what little they had by way of facilities. Undeterred, the players and the coaches continued enthusiastically and tried to get better at the sport they clearly loved.
Escaping the traffic, we met up with one of India’s Futsal pioneers. And yes, we know it’s not football in its purest form. But that’s where a sizeable number of youngsters start playing football. The founders of the North East Futsal league sat down with us to tell us about this newfound obsession in this football-crazy part of the country. After a quick discussion about the state of football in India, we were invited to speak with an AIFF-recognised coach as he went about doling out daily lessons to some of the kids in the academy. Far away from the glitz and glamour of top-tier football, the kids here merely want to play and that was evident in their smiles that our photo and video team could capture rather easily. The coach too had left high-paying assignments elsewhere to scout for raw talent in Guwahati.
With a glimpse at grassroots football, we continued onwards. But the start of the weekend meant that we had to grapple with the touristy traffic making their way to the hill station of Shillong. The Venue, however, continued helping us in our quest to truly understand Indian football with a super slick DCT gearbox and a very punchy engine. A drive that takes less than three hours however, took us north of five hours as we found ourselves stuck behind scores of cars exiting Guwahati.
But the painstakingly long wait seemed entirely worth it as the perfectly-surfaced roads that snaked through
the rolling meadows of Meghalaya were a joy to drive on. Aided by the very eager turbo petrol motor of the Venue, we had a drive that was truly memorable, not just for the brilliant roads, but also for the sublime handling that the Venue offered.
We left the hills of Meghalaya as we left for Silchar. The road that led there demanded a challenging 14-hour drive over a variety of road surfaces. The Venue was up to it and we could make merry on the good roads while dismissing the bad roads on the way without so much as a furrow on our foreheads. Making our way back into Assam, we were startled by the stark differences from what we had witnessed a few days ago. The language, the culture and even the topography was remarkably different than what we had come across in a different part of Assam. The tea gardens were not around and small villages now dominated our line of sight, no matter where we looked. A quick glance at the extremely useful Apple CarPlay and Android Auto-enabled infotainment system was enough to confirm, though, that we were on the right course. On a drive as long as this, the absolute abundance of creature comforts in the Venue proved to be a boon and Team evo India can certainly vouch for the generous number of charging ports in the cabin in addition to the wireless charging pad.
Despite the obvious differences, the love for football continued as we went further East, as evidenced by the numerous jubilant barefooted kids playing by the roadside that we passed every few minutes. As we got closer to Imphal, the frequency of those sightings out of the Venue’s windows increased and so did the conversations about football that we had with the locals.
The absolute lack of motorable roads slowed us down considerably but with the Venue’s impressive braking, we could afford to carry much more speed than we would otherwise be comfortable with. Also aiding us during the hours and hours of off-road driving was the suspension setup that absorbed everything that was thrown its away keeping the passengers in the back well rested.
The relationship that the people had with the sport took on a much more nuanced and complex form as the Hyundai Great India Drive progressed. The people that we met in the North East understood the game intimately and were, more often than not, saddened that footballing talent in the region stood largely untapped. At the same time, the love and passion for football here is something that has to be seen to be believed.
It was during one of the many chats about football at one of the numerous tea breaks that we had on the Great India Drive that this correspondent developed an appreciation for the game that he simply didn’t have earlier. And since then, tidbits of information from every person we spoke to, every football ground we visited and every kid we saw play has added immensely to this story in a way that words simply can’t do justice.
Football is one of the numerous threads that tie this vast, incredible country together and regardless of where you stand on football, you can take a moment to appreciate the effect that the barefooted Mohammedan SC footballer has had on Indian football and subsequently the unity and diversity that we pride ourselves on.
By the way, Mohammed Salim was the outrageously talented youngster who heralded the end of British domination both on and subsequently, off the field. Googling him will only get you information about a namesake. For the real deal, I urge you to do what we did and set sail on a road trip across the North East. And if you do, I hope that you decide to do so in something as capable and comfortable as the Hyundai Venue. ⌧
AIDING US DURING THE HOURS OF OFF-ROAD DRIVING WAS THE SUSPENSION THAT
SEEMINGLY ABSORBED EVERYTHING