From afar, it looked like a regular five-a-side football game. But on moving closer, one found the players moving around with eye masks, beneath which were eye patches, making them completely blind, led solely by the sound of the ball that jingled as it rolled around.
For many who watched an exhibition game of the Indian women’s blind football team at Gamma football turf at Chilavannoor, it was their first time. Among them were Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy, State government’s officer on special duty for external cooperation Venu Rajamony and actor Sijoy Varghese.
The Indian women’s blind football team is all set to participate in the eight-team IBSA World Games set to get under way at the University of Birmingham from August 14 to 21. When India takes on Austria in the first match on August 14, history will be made as an Indian women’s team will be participating in a world championship for the first time.
“We had started developing the women’s blind football team alongside the men’s only three years ago. Now we have about 100 registered players across eight State teams. We are eyeing a podium finish since that alone will bring us the recognition of Paralympic India along with the much needed funding. Now, the game is being run solely on sponsorship, including corporate social responsibility funds,” said Sunil J. Mathew, sporting director of the Indian Blind Football Federation (IBFF) and head coach of the women’s team.
Japan and Australia are the two other teams to make it to the Games from the Asia/Oceania region.
India has fielded a young team with an average age of 18 years. The youngest player of the squad is 12-year-old striker Akshara Rana from Uttarakhand. “Her name will be heard a lot more in the days to come. Being a minor, it was difficult to get her the passport for which we had to secure authorisation from her parents and arrange for two local guardians,” said Mr. Mathew.
The 10-member team has players from Gujarat, Maharashtra, West Bengal, Uttarakhand and Kerala. While two of them were completely blind, the remaining six suffered from blindness in excess of 40%.
The coming together of players from various places, speaking different languages and following diverse castes and religions, prompted Ms. Roy to observe that the team was the best thing she had seen in a long time. “I believe that sports liberates women’s bodies more than almost anything else. This team is not just going abroad or winning, but this is the kind of confidence building and liberation that not just people who are visually challenged, but all women should experience,” she said, before donating ₹1 lakh she won as a literary prize to the team.
Earlier, addressing the gathering, team manager M.C. Roy said the team was still short of ₹15 lakh, out of the estimated expenses of ₹43 lakh, with hardly a week left for the Games to get under way. The IBFF has embarked on a crowdfunding initiative to bridge the gap in funding.
