Big sister is the one that got away

This is the story of not just one team of footballers, but of Assamese sports. There are as many reasons as there are guilty parties: Players talk about lack of infrastructure and opportunities while the officials and coaches point to lack of aspirations and the single-mindedness to succeed.

Coach Gogoi talks of Shankar Barman, judged the best goalkeeper at the Subroto Cup. He was called for the junior national camp at Kolkata but today plays for the Assam State Electricity Board in the local league.

His teammate Sushanta Mazumdar went a step farther; picked by the Tata Football Academy’s scouts, he joined Mohun Bagan. He soon got home sick, though, and took the easy option. He joined the North-eastern Frontier Railways and — more importantly — got a Guwahati posting.

It’s a mindset — lahe-lahe, roughly translating as laidback to an extreme level — that sickens Gogoi, also the sports editor of The Assam Tribune. ‘‘The aspiration level of Assamese sportspersons is very low. And since they come mainly from poor families, the means of livelihood becomes important after a certain period.’’

It’s not that Assam hasn’t produced any sports stars. There’s Bhogeshwar Barua, 800m gold-winner in the 1966 Asiad, Olympic shuttler Dipankar Bhattacharya, national discus champion Tabu Nishad, national table tennis champion Monalisa Barua. More recently, the swimming feats of Elvis Ali Hazarika and Mithu Barua. And not forget the promising medium pacer Mark Ingty. The Khasi boy, who represents Assam in Ranji Trophy is said to be an India material. But it’s a meagre list when compared to the smaller, less developed neighbours in the region.

There’s more to it than the mindset, says Capt Robin Bordoloi, formerly director in charge of the Sports Authority of India in Guwahati. Though agreeing with Gogoi, he adds to that the fear factor. ‘‘Many coaches don’t want to come here citing law and order problems, they use influence to avoid getting a posting’’, Bordoloi said.

If coaches from outside can avoid the insurgency problem, obviously the Assamese can’t. Upen Deka was a promising footballer from Nalbari in the 1980s, representing Assam at the junior and senior levels to great success. It’s only a mild untruth that when Deka played there was always a full house.

But before he could reach his full potential, Deka joined the Assam agitation and went on to become one of the top leaders of the All-Assam Students Union (AASU). Later, he took up arms and joined the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and was killed in a shoot-out. These are problems that also exist in neighbouring states, including Manipur, Nagaland and Mizoram, which have thrown up a number of international stars.

‘‘The choice of events too is at fault’’, says Subhash Basumatary, the present director in charge of SAI in Guwahati. ‘‘For many years we were dealing with just football and athletics, while we should have given more importance to contact sports like boxing, taekwondo, karate and judo.

North-eastern states have been doing pretty well in these games for a long time. As recently as two years ago, Assam was the sub-junior national champion in boxing. The following year again the girls came up with another commendable show.’’ It’s the same familiar story: talent and ability going nowhere. That’s the pity of Assamese sport; the greater pity is that there seems no sign of change.