HISTORY OF INDIA'S SPORT

Author : Aditya Mane

In 1721 AD, a bunch of British sailors decided to play a game of cricket on India’s western seaboard, Cambay. Cricket became the first English sport introduced in India.

Our elites used to learn cricket in schools before the independence era and the grassroots audience used to replicate it turning the game into religion now. The game of Polo transformed into a rule-based form in Manipur during the 19th century. Later it found its path to Europe & North America in the 21st century.

Mohun Bagan, the oldest football club, was established in 1889 AD. It grew from strength to strength after 1911 when Bengal crowd reacted to British jibes in a physical culture movement. This lead to a win in the Indian Football Association final. India has been a world champion at some point in Cricket,Kabbadi, Chess, Hockey, Wrestling, Billiards & Badminton.

We have won 28 medals since we first competed as a team in the Olympics, 1920. Out of nine gold medals, India won eight of them in field hockey between 1928 and 1980.Field hockey is not our national game as recently pointed by an RTI filing. Infact, India has not declared any sport as the national game.

Now , currently England tour India has started.

Domination -

In the 20th century, India emerged as a Hockey superpower. From its Olympic debut in 1928, the Indian Hockey team went on dominate the competition for close to 6 decades, winning gold on 8 occasions. India is the only team to have won 6 consecutive Olympic gold medals. The team scored a massive 178 goals during this phase while conceding only 7 goals. No other team in the world has managed to come even close to rivalling such dominance.

Among others, the country has given the world such hockey legends like Major Dhyan Chand (who is considered as arguably the best player to ever grace the game), Sr. Balbir Singh, Udham Singh, and Gurbux Singh.