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Every four years, Kolkata becomes a battleground for Argentina and Brazil supporters, even though India has never qualified for the FIFA World Cup. Tracing football’s journey from colonial Calcutta to the rise of the Blue Tigresses, this is the story of India’s enduring love affair with the beautiful game and the structural challenges that continue to hold it back.
Only two events merit both 'defacing' and festooning the decrepit walls and narrow lanes in Kolkata’s old neighbourhoods: one is an election; the other is the FIFA World Cup. Every four years, the city known as the ‘Mecca of Indian Football’ decks up in blue and white or green and yellow — the national colours of Argentina or Brazil. Half a world away from the action, the great Latin American football rivalry plays out in the paras (Bengali for ‘neighbourhoods’) of Kolkata. This happens every four years during the FIFA World Cup, in a country that has never qualified for one. It is, depending on how you want to look at it, either the most romantic thing about Indian football or the most tragic indictment of it.
Football arrived in Kolkata — then Calcutta — in the 1850s, with British soldiers and civil servants who used the vast green expanse of the Maidan as their playing ground. The city became the earliest and most fertile ground for the sport outside of Britain itself, making Kolkata’s football story inseparable from the history of the sport, as well as from colonialism and the Indian response to it. The game spread quickly beyond British garrisons. Bengali ‘babus’ or middle-class men, mill workers from Bihar and Odisha, migrants and refugees from East Bengal — all found in football, the common language of sports and the pursuit of human excellence.
By the 1880s, Indian clubs were forming, playing, and occasionally defeating their colonial administrators on the very turf the British had claimed as their own. The Mohun Bagan AC (now Mohun Bagan Super Giant) was established in 1889, followed by the Mohammedan Sporting Club in 1891 and East Bengal FC in 1920. Mohun Bagan’s famous 1911 IFA Shield victory over the East Yorkshire Regiment transformed football into a symbol of anti-colonial resistance and national pride. For much of the twentieth century, Kolkata was regarded as the heart of Indian football, while football flourished elsewhere in Goa, Kerala, Jammu & Kashmir, and especially the Northeastern states.
Today, some of India’s most football-obsessed regions lie far from the country’s urban centres of power. Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland, and Sikkim have produced most of the country’s finest players, while local leagues and community tournaments remain central to social life. The sport enjoys a level of cultural significance in these regions that cricket simply does not. Yet the grassroots passion for football has not translated into sustained success for Indian football on the global stage.
The primary reason for this is the lack of infrastructure. While countries that consistently qualify for the FIFA World Cup invest heavily in youth academies, coaching and scouting networks, and sports science, India’s football ecosystem remains fragmented and largely overshadowed by cricket. Many talented players grow up without access to quality coaching, professional facilities, or clear paths into professional arenas. For decades, football administration in India suffered from bureaucratic inefficiency, inconsistent planning, and inadequate investment in grassroots development. Although the Indian Super League has brought greater visibility, sponsorship, and professionalism to the sport, much of that investment remains concentrated at the top rather than funding long-term talent development.
Competition from cricket has further complicated these challenges. Since the Kapil Dev-led Indian Cricket Team’s 1983 World Cup win, sustained success in international tournaments and the game’s commercialisation since the 1990s have led to cricket receiving a disproportionate share of media attention, sponsorship, and institutional support in India. Football, despite its enormous popularity as a spectator sport, rarely enjoys the same level of systemic support in India.
Yet there are signs of a brighter future for the people’s game in India — particularly through women’s football. Over the past decade, the Indian women’s national team has become one of the most promising chapters in India’s football history. Once delisted by FIFA for more than 18 months in 2009, India’s women’s football team has clawed its way back into the spotlight, making remarkable strides in recent years.
In July 2025, the Indian women’s team — known as the ‘Blue Tigresses’ — qualified for the AFC Women’s Asian Cup for the first time. In the qualifiers for the AFC Women’s Asian Cup 2026, India showcased their strength by stunning Thailand 3–1, thanks in part to midfielder Sangita Basfore, who scored two impressive goals. While India is currently ranked 70th in the world in Women’s football, the team is steadily climbing with young talents like Hemam Shilky Devi, Jyoti Chauhan, and Naorem Priyangka Devi leading the charge.
It is ironic that Kolkata, which still sends thousands of boys and girls onto Maidan pitches every morning in a tradition now more than a century and a half old, is also the city whose two great football institutions — Mohun Bagan and East Bengal — spent the first months of 2026 unsure whether their season would happen at all, caught in a dispute between a federation and a broadcaster that had nothing to do with the quality of football being played in India.
But the women’s team offers a glimpse of Indian football’s potential. Their progress suggests that the country’s problem has never been a lack of talent or passion, but rather the absence of a system that nurtures both. India’s football culture is vast, historic, and intensely emotional. From the Kolkata Derby and the refugee histories embedded in East Bengal’s support base to the football grounds of Imphal and Aizawl, the sport holds a unique place in the country’s national imagination. The challenge is no longer to generate enthusiasm or passion for the game; India already has that in abundance. The challenge is to transform that enthusiasm into institutions and infrastructure capable of competing with the world’s best.
