[zakir]

This is basically a followup of Sam's article and I am afraid that it may be a little long. Before making my points, let me review briefly the history (simplified) of the modern Bengali middle class.

Bengali middle class was essentially started with the creation of Calcutta University during late 18th century. In literature this class is known as "Bhoddorlok Class" and the popular nick name of this class is GHOTI. During that time they established a club named Mohon Bagan Club. Also at the same time the Zamindars (Land Lords) and the rich people of East Bengal (Present day Bangladesh) started to buy homes in Calcutta. They also started sending their sons to Calcutta for College and University education. They were rich and used to spend more money than the Ghotis. The Ghotis didn't like that . They started to call these people from East Bangal as BAANGAAL in a derogatory way. Thus a sweet rivalry started. Eventually the East Bengalis in Calcutta established their own club named East Bengal Club. Slowly this rivalry moved in the soccer field and the great East Bengal-Mohon Bagan rivalry was born.

Now during that time the conditions of the Muslim Bengalis were not very good. They were lagging in every sphere of life. Muslim middle class members were non-Bengalis (nawab of Dhaka, etc). The nucleusof Benglai Muslim middle-class was actually created by Mohd. Nasiruddin by starting to publish the magazine Sowgat with poet Nazrul as the editor. Nazruls popularity was soaring that time. The Bengali Muslims were desperately looking for something to be proud of. In addition to Nazrul, they found pride in Abbasuddin's songs and in late thirties they found the fine brand of football played by Calcutta Mohammedan Sporting Club. They started to support the team with great emotion and pride. Calcutta Mohammedan became champion for eight years in a row to create a broad base of supporters. These Big three created a unique club based soccer culture among the Bengalis The Bengalis became soccer crazy nation and Calcutta became the center of Indian Soccer.

After 1947, this trend continued in the erstwhile East Pakistan and Dhaka quickly became the center of Pakistan football and we have seen Mohammedan-Victoria, Mohammedan-Wandarers, Mohammedan-EPIDC (later BJMC) rivalry. After independence we have seen the creation of great Abahani-Mohammedan rivalry. During our time (late 70's and early 80's) this was a part of our life. Of course there was a change. This rivalry was expanded in the other fields of sports like cricket and hockey. In fact this rivalry is one of the factors of Cricket becoming a popular game.

Now let's talk about Bengali's history a little bit more. We all know that before British, Bengal was ruled from Dhaka and then from Murshidabad. British created the the modern administrative system of Bengal (Bangladesh and West Bengal) with the provincial govt. in Calcutta and the local govt. in divisions, districts, and sub-divisions. Among these, the DISTRICTS were the nerve center of the cultural and economic life of the Bengalis. With time people started to identify themselves with his/her home districts. This was not true for divisions or sub-divisions. Even now when people are asked about their bari or desh (where are they from), the Bangladeshis usually mention the name of their home didtricts (or greater districts). In Bangladesh we always see people are very proud of their home districts (now greater districts).

Now based on the review of our history I want make the following points.

1) Since club culture is soo deep rooted in our life, we should not destroy that. Let Dhaka Premier League remain as our main league for the limited over cricket. Even though they are Dhaka based clubs, we know that they have supporters all over the country. We don't need to include the limited over matches in the National League. Then Dhaka league will not remain the main limited over tournament and thus will loose it's glamour.

2) National League should focus on the longer version of the game ONLY. The key question is how to make it attractive involving the teams with enthusiastic supporter base. In my opinion (based on our culture), if we have one team from each greater districts, we will have a crowd pulling first-class tournament. We can remember that in erswhile East Pakistan Inter-District tournament was the most popular one after Dhaka league. There was Barisal-Comilla rivalry for some time.

We have 17 greater districts (considering Tangail in Mymensing and Patuakhali in Barisal). As Sam pointed out that too many teams may be a problem. We need to do some brainstorming here to devise a Nation League system involving 17 teams. (India's Rangi trophy has about 20 teams).

3) We also need a regular first-class tournamnet like last Challange Cup, where National team (BCB XI), A team and the Development squad will play. We can make it somewhat like Busta Cup by inviting a foreign team. Any A team, state team from India, or Provincial team from Pakistan will make it attractive and useful.