Waking up after decades of hibernation

Tariquzzaman Nannu, a former hockey player and organiser, has been fighting an uphill battle for about two decades to try and revive women's hockey in Bangladesh which has been in hibernation since the 70s.

In post-independent Bangladesh, there was a deliberate effort to kick-start women's hockey, much before women's cricket or football was a thing in this part of the world.

Parvin Nasima Nahar Putul, a trailblazer in women's sports in Bangladesh, was among the first female players to take up hockey in the country.

"I played many other sports but my first game was hockey. In those days, a lot of educated girls played hockey," Putul told The Daily Star.

Putul, who was a college student when she started playing hockey, spoke about how the women's hockey was developing in the 80s.

"We played hockey for five consecutive years from 1976. Usually we played matches in Dhaka but we also travelled to Tangail to play against the Tangail girls, Bharateshwari homes and the Narayanganj team.

"Ehtesam [Sultan] sir, Protap [Sankar Hazra] da, [Abdus] Salam bhai, Abdur Razzak [Sona Mia] bhai and others toiled hard to train women's hockey players."

However, financial constraints and other shortcomings brought an abrupt end to this early endeavor.

"That time a team was selected for a tour of Pakistan but it did not happen. Women's hockey came to a halt because of organising and financial reasons," she said.

Even though the early attempts to establish women's hockey ended abruptly, the photographic evidence of that endeavour remain and one such photo inspired Nannu to begin his journey to bring back women's hockey.

"I was astonished to see an iconic photograph of the women's hockey team perhaps captured in 1977. The players, wearing hockey shorts, posed for the photos at the Paltan ground," said Nannu.

Nannu, who played hockey at the top flight from 1982 to 1996, got posted in Dhaka from Narayanganj as Sports Directorate's sports officer in 2001 and a few years later began the revival of women's hockey in Dhaka in 2006.

He arranged hockey training for the girls in Dhanmondi Qumrunnessa Girls High School, Dhanmondi Govt. Girls School and Viqarunnisa Noon High School but soon realised the error in his ways.

"After conducting the training for a few years in Dhaka, I realised that the girls here are focused more on their studies. I need to go to the district level through the District Sports Offices.

"I then selected some districts to conduct the training for women's hockey players that laid the foundation for the first national women's hockey competition in 2012," said the 62-year-old organiser adding that later three more national women's hockey competitions were held in 2014, 2016 and 2018.

Nannu informed that around 60 talented girls from 17 districts were picked for higher training under a Sports Directorate programme.

Women's hockey again came under the spotlight in 2018 when Kolkata Warriors Athletic Club came to Bangladesh for a three-match series against Dhaka Eleven, a team formed from the trainees of the Sports Directorate programme, and host girls swept that series 3-0.

Next year, Sports Authority of India (SAI) Academy's women's hockey team also came to Dhaka for a six-match series against Bangladesh's first women's Under-21 women's hockey team, which was formed to take part in the Women's Junior AHF Cup for the very first time later that year in Singapore.

The hosts lost the series 6-0 but claimed a victory in their maiden participation in the Junior AHF Cup, defeating Sri Lanka 2-0.

Putul, who was the coordinator of Bangladesh women's hockey team in Singapore, said she was ecstatic to see the revival of women's hockey.

"The girls of this generation play really well. I can't say how happy I am for the revival of women's hockey. I got involved with women's hockey at the age of 67 and took care of the girls twice a day during the camp."

Before retiring from the Sports Directorate as assistant director, Nannu in collaboration with BKSP, trained 18 players as community coaches for women's hockey who have kept the wheels of women's hockey rolling in districts like Dhaka, Narayaganj, Narail, Jashore, Jhenaidah, Patuakhali, Kishoreganj, Mymensingh, Cox's Bazar, Rajshahi, Dinajpur, Rangpur and Thakurgaon.

Some of the trained hockey players have already switched to other sports while some have dropped out of the scene.

Nannu is hopeful that the chance to participate in international and domestic events will raise the spirits of the players and attract more girls to the sport.

"The federation will send a team to the upcoming Women's Junior AHF Cup next month in Singapore which will raise some hope for the girls who were frustrated with no competitions in recent past. We have also heard the federation will hold a women's hockey league, which will be a big step towards a good future for women's hockey."

BKSP, the country's lone sports education institution, opened a women's hockey department in 2020. Currently, 34 students are enrolled in the department of which 20 are in the 33-member preliminary squad for the Women's Junior AHF Cup.

"The national men's hockey team is full of BKSP players. So, BKSP feels that if the national women's hockey team is formed in the future, then our students will represent the national women's team," said BKSP's hockey head coach Zahid Hossain Raju, who will also coach the Bangladesh team in Singapore.

Despite Nannu's work and the efforts of the others involved, women's hockey is still in its nascent stage in the country.

Asked what is the prospect of women's hockey in the country, Nannu remained optimistic.

"We have created a platform for them to come and play. I think the platform is still working and we just need to continue the process."