Daughter of plumber and fan of Ronaldo, 13-year-old Gaganjot rising through the ranks

“My father Babu Singh works as a plumber in the village. When I first saw football training at the village and told my father to get me enrolled, he supported my dream to play football. Playing in the sub-division and later the winning of Ludhiana district team in the state championship motivated me a lot. Today’s best player award too is a special feeling,” says Gaganjot, who idolises Portuguese football giant Cristiano Ronaldo.

Gaganjot’s teammate Khushpreet Kaur, who captained the village side to the title, had started playing football four years ago at the government school in the village and later joined the training centre. The youngster whose father runs an aluminium fitting shop in the village, was part of the division team in the district level competition this year. “Our parents have always supported our dream to play football. Sports has empowered us and winning on the football ground always motivates us,” says Khushpreet, who is an ardent fan of Spanish footballer Sergio Ramos.

In the boys’ under-16 final, the team of Fazulchak scored a 3-0 win over Kamalpura. Prem C (15) scored two goals in the final and six goals in the competition. “My father Dalbir Masih is a daily wage contract farmer and when I started playing football at the government school in our village in 2018, his only concern was the kit cost. Later I joined the centre at the village training under coach Naresh Kumar,” said Prem C, who too idolises Ronaldo.

The foundation is working in more than 400 villages supporting football in 350 villages and volleyball in 50 villages. The sports centres in these villages have engaged more than 12,000 young children to play football apart from volleyball at some of the villages.

“The tournament provided an opportunity to more than 4,000 players from more than 300 villages to showcase their talent. The Roundglass programme provided them training in a professional way and talents like Gaganjot can train at the specialised centres under AIFF licensed coaches,” said Vishal Chowla, leader, Roundglass Foundation.

“Today they are playing for the district teams and we see them playing for Punjab and India in future. That has been the vision of our founder Sunny Gurpreet Singh,” Chowla concluded.