Punjab reclaims its astroturf, and how

The 18-member Indian team at the Champions Trophy has 10 players from Punjab, including veteran Baljit Singh Dhillon and Tejbir Singh, whose understated role yesterday kept India’s game together.

Then there’s the coach, Rajinder Singh, and his deputy Baldev Singh.

‘‘It’s been a long time since I’ve seen so many players from Punjab playing for India’’, said former Indian captain Pargat Singh, Sports Officer for Punjab Police, which has five employees in the current India team.

The main reason for that is, of course, the lost years of the militancy in the state, when hockey was almost wiped out by the reign of terror. It was a point made by Indian captain Dhanraj Pillay who recalled, on NDTV’s ‘Walk the Talk’ programme with The Indian Express Editor-in-Chief Shekhar Gupta, how playing hockey in the Punjab of the 1980s was almost impossible.

Pillay had also acknowledged then that the current reprise of Punjab’s dominance was a direct fallout of the return of peace to the state.

Several of the current players were directly affected by the militancy. Gagan Ajit’s family in Ferozepur, a border district and one of the hotbeds of the militancy, had to contend with repeated threats and attacks from militants.

Today, Gagan Ajit’s father Ajit Singh, an Olympian, is delighted at the sport’s revival. ‘‘Hockey enjoys the same status in Punjab as football in Kolkata. This game is in our blood and gels with the fighting spirit of the Punjabis.’’

He puts the quality of players down to the hockey academies that have proliferated — more than a dozen in the state, four in Jalandhar alone. ‘‘They have done a wonderful job in producing players of international class’’, he says.

Pargat echoes his view. ‘‘The academies are producing quality players because they have the best facilities in the country’’, he said.

So strong is the sentiment for hockey, though, that even this success doesn’t satisfy some. Olympian Sukhbir Singh Grewal believes there is scope for improvement.

‘‘The game has to be spread at the grassroot level. When we used to play, there were 40 to 50 college teams playing the game; the number is down to 10-12 colleges right now. We should follow in Holland’s footsteps, where there are more than 1,200 clubs and thousands of players.’’

If there was any silver lining to Punjab’s decade-long absence from the hockey mainstream, it’s the fact that it gave other hockey-playing areas a chance. Players from Jharkhand, Chhotanagpur and Maharashtra, so far kept on the margins, started getting a regular place on the Indian team. Today, Dhanraj Pillay and Dilip Tirkey are as integral as Pargat once was.

So, with Punjab back in the fray, it can only mean more competition for the national team. A welcome development, says former India captain MP Ganesh, currently a member of the International Hockey Federation’s Rules Committee.

‘‘Punjab has always contributed to hockey and I was fortunate to play alongside some of the best players in my career. Gagan and Jugraj won the match for us yesterday; it’s heartening to see these players continue the great tradition.’’