Pearce, Malcolm and Stewart, Geoffrey: British Political
History 1867-1990, Democracy and Decline, (Routledge, 1992), p.556
The 1950 FIFA World Cup was the first edition of the
tournament since 1938 and, more importantly, the first since the end of the
Second World War. While several notable teams had not participated in the tournaments
of the 1930s due to geographical constraints (or inflated ideas of their own
superiority) the reasons behind a number of teams’ absence in 1950 came as a
direct result of the preceding conflict. Germany, both occupied and divided by
the Allied Powers, were banned from taking part as were Japan for similar
reasons. The Soviet Union, Hungary and Czechoslovakia all refused to enter in
part due to the devastating impact of the Second World War on their countries
but also due to the increasing hostility between the communist East and the capitalist
West. Yugoslavia, as it did in many cases throughout the Cold War, bucked the
trend. The impact of the Second World War extended to the location of the 1950
tournament with Brazil selected as hosts from a fairly narrow pool of countries
with the necessary infrastructure in place to host a major sporting event.
The end of the Second World War signalled the beginning of
the end of the age of empires and in Group 10 of the qualification tournament a
different story began to unfold. As the war in the Pacific drew to a conclusion
the Philippines regained its independence from the defeated Japanese Empire.
Indonesia was also granted independence from the Japanese as well as the
Netherlands who had officially held the territory as the Dutch East Indies
since 1800. Perhaps the most significant, however, was the secession of the
Indian subcontinent by the British Empire in 1947 which led to the foundation
of modern day India and Pakistan as well as East Bengal (now Bangladesh)
shortly followed by Burma (now Myanmar) in 1948. In consequence the four Asian
teams to initially enter the qualification stages of the 1950 FIFA World Cup
were all newly independent nations intent on making a statement of their
sporting and political intentions in a postcolonial world.
Despite the fact that Indonesia had appeared, albeit briefly,
as the Dutch East Indies at the 1938 tournament in France (suffering a 6-0
defeat at the hands of Hungary) it was India who now, following the Second
World War, made the earliest impression on the game. In the 1948 Summer Olympic
football tournament India drew France in the first round and were a minute away
from taking the game to extra time thanks to an equalising goal from
Sarangapani Raman. Unfortunately an 89th minute winner from René
Persillon denied them the opportunity to take on the hosts Great Britain, their
former colonial rulers, in the next round. Nevertheless the Indian team had
turned heads in their first international match following independence a feat
drawing even more praise considering that several members of the Indian team
played in bare feet or just socks. When you see a 1940s football, or the
heavyweight boots of their opponents, you’ll perhaps appreciate how impressive
this actually was.
However, before even one of these weighty footballs could be
kicked in Group 10 the Filipino, Indonesian and Burmese teams withdrew from the
competition. Israel, Syria and Turkey had been drawn in separate groups and,
despite appearing in the 1948 Olympics, Afghanistan and South Korea did not
enter the qualifying process. This allowed India to qualify for the final
tournament at the first attempt, despite being unopposed, and on May 22nd
1950 were drawn in Group C alongside 1934 and 1938 World Cup winners Italy,
1948 Olympic gold medallists Sweden and 1949 Copa América runners-up Paraguay.
In today’s terms this could be seen as the tournament’s ‘Group of Death’ but
India had already proved they could hold their own on the international stage
against even the strongest opposition.
But the Indian team of 1950 did not get to test themselves
against these lauded opponents for, shortly after the draw for the group stage
was made, the team was withdrawn from the competition by the All India Football
Federation. A number of reasons were given including the federation’s desire to
focus on the Summer Olympic football tournaments, which were still seen as the
superior international competition, and the cost involved to transport the
squad to Brazil for the competition although FIFA claimed to have offered a
substantial contribution to the travel expenses. For a long time the belief was
that India had withdrawn following FIFA’s decision to ban footballers from
playing barefoot after the 1948 Olympics although this had been refuted by
Sailen Manna, the team’s
captain at the time, who instead pointed to a lack of adequate training and
preparation: a fair enough point considering India had not played another
international game since their defeat by France.