Hockey’s magician Dhyan Chand’s legacy endures in Visakhapatnam

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Hockey players from the under-14, under-17 and under-18 categories, train under national player and coach Peter Das at the Government High School at Railway New Colony, Visakhapatnam. | Photo Credit: V RAJU

As India observes National Sports Day on Saturday, marking the birth anniversary of hockey legend Major Dhyan Chand, hockey personalities in Visakhapatnam recalled his enduring influence on the sport and on generations of players from the region.

June Gallyot, District Sports Development Officer, said she had a personal connection to the Dhyan Chand family. “As the first girl from Andhra Pradesh to have represented the country in hockey, and then later becoming a professional hockey coach, I had the honour of playing along with Dhyan Chand’s granddaughter Nidhi,” she said, adding that his son, Ashok Kumar, was also a celebrated player. “The whole family are into the game of hockey,” she said.

Peter Das, a national hockey player and coach from Visakhapatnam, said watching newsreels of Dhyan Chand’s era at school had shaped his own decision to take up the game. “We used to see documentaries of those games in school. They showed how India went abroad and won gold medals. That is how we saw Dhyan Chand playing hockey so skilfully. Those documentaries were a big influence on us, and all the boys wanted to go to school and play hockey,” said Mr. Das, who recalled watching the documentaries around 1976-77, at the age of 13.

Noel Treasure, a hockey player and president of the Friends Hockey Association, described Dhyan Chand as a transformative figure. “He was a quiet, humble man whose unparalleled, almost magical skill with the ball earned him the title ‘Wizard’,” Mr. Treasure said: “His natural talent and on-field dominance were instrumental in elevating hockey from a British import to a globally recognised sport.”

S. Ravi Shankar, former president and patron at the Friends Hockey Association, recalled hockey’s standing when he played the sport as a boy in the 1970s. “Hockey was a very popular game. India was known as a country globally because of hockey,” he said, crediting Dhyan Chand’s dominance for that reputation. “Indians were wizards with the hockey stick; the ball would get stuck to the hockey stick. They just move around, and were able to even trick four or five guys, and shoot goals.” He also recalled the account of Adolf Hitler offering Dhyan Chand a commission in the German army after India’s 8-1 win over Germany in the 1936 Berlin Olympics final, an offer he declined out of loyalty to his country.

Dhyan Chand led India to Olympic gold in 1928, 1932 and 1936 and remains hockey’s most decorated figure. Ms. Gallyot said National Sports Day should serve as a reminder of what the sport once meant to the city. “As we celebrate National Sports Day, I think it’s a resolution that we have to make to ourselves and bring back the great glory of the national game of hockey in Visakhapatnam,” she said.

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