Latey Bhakundo

(Based on a true story, remembered nearly after 20 years so the writer might have missed out on some important characters and sequence of events) Today I suddenly remembered my school days. Oh yes that particular day when we had bunked Nepali elocution and were playing football in the ground.What a brilliant decision I had made as my dad was one of the judges!. Renuka maam came, we tried to run but again we decided to face her like men and I thought she was the wife of our coach and would support us playing football. Within minutes I was proved wrong. Maam looked very serious and asked us to line up. I was wearing a single pair of football boot and the left boot was on my right leg, we had few boots and we were sharing it. Santosh was even worst looking "dapper" in those dirty t-shirt which he used to wear below his school shirt. We marched straight to the Principal's office. He was in the auditorium attending the elocution. Mr Phuchung was there and he ...

Footballer Nirmal Chettri recently visited the place from where his journey into professional football started. This place often underrated has produced many talented footballers over the years from Sikkim along with Nirmal himself. Yes its the Namchi Sports Hostel. Set up in 1999 by the Government of Sikkim under the “Search for more Bhaichungs scheme”. Namchi Sports Hostel has survived the test of times and is still doing what it had been set up for and this kind of support and encouragement from its former students is always welcome. Nirmal posted in his facebook profile “This hostel has produced many International i.e Sanju Pradhan, Bikash Jairu, Dawa Lepcha, Uttam Rai, Ashish Karki, Nim Dorjee Tamang, Novin Gurung, Ashish Pradhan & Komal Thatal etc and National players like Michael Lepcha, Veer Pradhan, Lepcha Nim Tshering, Karma Lendup Lepcha, Engphohang Subba & Sanjay Chettri Chettri and more”. This gesture by Nirmal might look routine and ...

On 10 th  April 2013 Kalimpong lost one of its finest footballers and not many were aware of it ,he did not earn public affection like Mini (Urgen Lama) or Pem Dorjee during his playing days, the reason being,he did not play much in his own home town.He spent most  of his life in Kolkata only to return after retirement to Kalimpong and settle here. This is an attempt to shed some light on the football career of Janga Bahadur Goutam. One of the foremost footballers to ply his trade outside the Darjeeling Hills, JB Goutam paved the way for others to follow. JB Goutam was a first generation footballer from his family. Born (3rd March, 1932)  in Kalimpong. Goutam spent his professional life in Kolkata serving as the store superintendent for Indian Airlines at the Dum Dum Airport while pl aying football for various teams for more than a decade. He played as a forward and was dangerous in front of the goal. A student of City College in Kolkata , he was s...

Recent announcement that Indian National Football Team Captain, Sunil Chhetri will be recommended for the Padma Shri has delighted football fans across the country and I am one of them.  Sunil has served Indian Football so well over the past many years and has been a perfect role model. With age he is becoming even better and I hope he will give us many more Wow! moments in the years to come.  His records and statistics has been well documented so I will not get into that but as an Indian Football fan I will try to recall those few moments when I got a chance to meet the star of Indian Football, Sunil Chhetri.  If I remember correctly first I heard about Sunil Chhetri was when I was in Kolkata during my college days around 2004 when my friend Abling Lepcha had mentioned his name. He had said a boy from the hills has joined Mohun Bagan.We were not aware back then Sunil was actually a Delhi Boy though his roots were Nepali. After that I don't recall much but d...