As a man dressed in high-waist white pants and a polo T-shirt announced a ‘toss’ to end a match of football in a lustrous garden of West Bengal’s Chuapara village, the spectators nervously held on to their china teacups. “It is not there in the official rules, but we had our own,” said Fuljence Barla, a goalie from the Bharnobari tea garden.
That match at Chaupara was one of the many Fuljence played in 1980. “Those were friendly matches between bagans (gardens). It was called the Goodwill Cup. A gift to us by our colonial masters,” he said. From the age of 14, Fuljence has played hundreds of matches for the tea estates. He is 68 now. The farthest place he has visited, however, is Siliguri, thanks to a district tournament.
“I know people from Santali who played district matches, but none of them entered the Nationals. When I was at my career peak, I remember that no outside association entertained the ‘garden players’,” Fuljence said. “Yes, we were called garden players,” he added, after a pause.
Fuljence, in his tea estate residence near Hasimara in West Bengal, fossicked through his collection of creamy-coloured, dull pictures of his debut match. He picked one, and remembered a match he played in late 80s. “It was getting dark. There were no big boundary lights like the ones we see today. We had to use the headlights of a truck and tractor to continue the match,” he snickered.
Like most players in the area, Fuljence used to be a tea-garden worker. He worked in the factory for Rs 60 per day. The culture of sports, borrowed from the Scottish-British colonial roots, used to be maintained by the tea-garden owners and managers for some time. “Things have changed now. The sport has become a betting ground, with increased violence. Also, the managers have stopped funding the football matches in the area,” said Fuljence.
“Financial problems and outward migration in the area are some of the problems that led to the fall,” said Arnab Ghosh, secretary at the Dhupguri Football Club, talking about the fall in the number of tournaments in the area. He also said some players were driven to alcoholism.
Ghosh was a lead player from 2007-15 for the Jalpaiguri Town Hall Club, and at the district level too. In 2009, he began his training in Mohun Bagan Academy, but returned home, to Dooars, after an injury. “The bagan matches were electric and fascinating, with a lot of people to watch it. But, the quality of matches in the area has gone down,” he said.
There were 16 tea estates around Birpara, now called Dalgaon. After 2009, around seven tea estates in the area closed. The ownership, since then, kept switching, and the gardens remained in a constant state of unrest.
“I am originally from Dalgaon. I am familiar with the football fan base there,” said Pappu Kisan, a managerial-level staff at Jorhat Tea Estate in Assam. “If a match was announced in Birpara, people from the neighbouring villages came for it. It was a popular sport that brought people together. It was also a part of the entertainment,” he said.
The change in ownership of gardens is not a recent phenomenon, said a researcher. The gardens in Dooars were formerly owned by some Scottish and the British, and have a rich colonial history. The investment, back in the 1850s till the independence of India, used to be under long-term profit-making goals. Like in other places, the colonial legacy without the mention of sports shall deem incomplete. The ‘sahibs‘ (owners/managers) of the time developed many sporting facilities within the area. But this was discontinued post-independence by the new sahibs, who belonged to the community of money lenders.
Considering the influence of cricket in the colonial history of sports, the domination of football in the tea gardens was unusual. But a similar trend is visible in other parts of West Bengal too. According to Fuljence, football as a sport was easier to understand than cricket. “It was less technical. We could play it barefoot with the least equipment. Cricket was so difficult to understand,” Fuljence said. “We also had a clubhouse, but only for sahibs,” he added.
The tall, white buildings with green, slanting tiles now stand empty, in a corner at the tea garden field in Hasimara. The dark-brown wood of the billiards’ table, once played by the sahibs of the bagan, are rotting. “The aristocracy was at a different level. There used to be two fields – one for golf and another for football. Sahibs loved to play golf and watch the labourers play football,” said Ghosh.
In 1990, when the tea industry suffered, and owners were in debt, gardens closed down. Most tea gardens here faced a financial downfall. Most gardens closed or changed owners every four months. The other main problem was the fact that the entire economy here rested on these tea gardens. Their closure led to labour migration.
The only sports shop at Birpara – Rita Agency – was opened in 1980. The owner, an octogenarian who wished to remain anonymous, said that until 2009, he used to get bulk orders from the surrounding tea gardens. Boots, jersey, trophy, and football topped the list. “A player, mostly the captain, used to come with a slip, on which the required equipment was written,” he said.
Now, there are four sports shops in Birpara. The owners complain of a steep fall in sales. “Football kits are expensive for most kids here, previously, they were provided by the managerial staff of the tea garden, but not anymore,” said one of the owners.
Even Fuljence remembered going to the sports shop in Hamiltonganj and asking the owner to shift his shop to Hasimara. “And he did, but the shop B.N Dey has shut because of low sale and the ongoing pandemic,” Fuljence said.
“In my football days, we used to get our jersey and boots from the bagan. It used to be for all the matches in the season. We used to keep it with the then captain, Biplob Sarkar,” Fuljence said.
On the lack of attention to the areas’ sports selection, Ghosh said that most of the trials for mainstream associations are limited to Siliguri. “Last year, Atletico de Kolkata, an ISL team from West Bengal, came to Dalgaon grounds for trials. Not a single player was selected. Why? It’s not like the area has no talent,” he said.
In the Dooars region, there are a few big stadiums, funded by the Sports and Youth Wing of the West Bengal Government, like in Cooch Behar, Jalpaiguri. Some of the grounds are in tea gardens of Dalgaon and Hasimara among others.
The workers from the tea gardens participated in these matches. In 2008, when Ghosh played at an inter-district in Jalpaiguri, at least five to six boys came from a tea-garden worker household.
“They used to play football as well as work in the gardens. It is the same even now. When a child turns 13-14 years of age, they start working in tea estates here. This is how it has been going on in tea gardens,” said Ghosh. “Things have not changed much between 2015 and 2020. Opportunities for a footballer, then and now, limited itself to Siliguri,” he added.
“Sports and football, its popularity, has limited itself to the big cities like Kolkata or smaller ones like Siliguri for North Bengal. Now, even these bigger clubs have become financially strong and can afford to bring players from outside. They choose to do it rather than encourage countryside talent,” Pappu Kishan said.
“Improvement and trials here are mere formalities. The association wants to show that the trials were held. But where are the players and why are they not getting selected. All of them cannot be bad, right?” Ghosh asked.
Ghosh has a suggestion too. “At least select ten players from here and take them to the primary level tryouts by mainstream football names in India. Even if nothing happens, the players will see hope again,” he said. “The culture of football may return to its former glory. There are many with potential, but no one to push,” Ghosh said.
