Watching the Prime Ministers of India and New Zealand reminisce about his father, hockey legend Dhyan Chand, on Saturday, Ashok Kumar’s heart swelled with pride.
“I feel proud that a team of Armymen, and a humble soldier in that team, did something so remarkable that even after 100 years, the Prime Ministers are talking about it, and it still connects people from both nations,” he told The Indian Express.
Long before he became the ‘Wizard of Hockey’, Dhyan Chand was a soldier in the Indian Army. “Duniya mein faujein banti hai goliyan chalane ke liye. Lekin Indian Army wahan gayi, aur goal se duniya ko chamatkar dikhaya (Soldiers in the world are made to fire bullets. But the Indian Army went there, and with their goals, showed the world a miracle),” he said.
In Auckland on Saturday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his New Zealand counterpart, Christopher Luxon, paid tribute to the landmark 1926 tour that introduced New Zealand to the genius of Dhyan Chand. “A hundred years ago, our hockey team created history by coming here,” Modi said. “It inspires our sporting partnership even today.”
Hockey India secretary-general Bhola Nath Singh called it “a matter of immense pride.”
The New Zealand Herald‘s first impression of Dhyan Chand, filed after an unofficial warm-up match against a Navy side in Auckland on May 13, 1926, read: “Four of the goals came from the stick of Dhyan Chand, a slightly-built youth, who played a remarkable game at centre-forward. His stick work and control of the ball were well-nigh perfect, and although he was a great individualist he always knew when to pass the ball.”
The tour had been almost two years in the making. Discussions between the New Zealand Hockey Association and the Army Sports Control Board began in late 1924, culminating in a formal invitation to the Indian Army in early 1925. Following trials in Lahore, the first-ever Indian hockey team was selected.
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Captain David Tennant Cowan led the 17-member squad — four British officers, one Sikh officer and 12 Indian soldiers — who sailed from then Calcutta on April 11, 1926, embarking on a month-long voyage across the Indian Ocean and the Tasman Sea, Ashok Kumar said.
Every stop became another exhibition. The team defeated sides in Sri Lanka and Australia before arriving in Auckland on May 11, where anticipation had reached fever pitch. The unofficial opener against the Navy side at Remuera only heightened it. India won 11-1, Dhyan Chand scoring four times, justifying the praise that appeared in the next morning’s papers.
Six weeks later, on June 26, 1926, India played its first official international at Lancaster Park in Christchurch before nearly 14,000 spectators, according to stick2hockey.com. Wearing red shirts, white shorts and red socks, India beat New Zealand 5-2. Dhyan Chand scored a hat-trick, including the first goal ever registered by an Indian team in international hockey.
Peter Miskimmin, New Zealand’s head of sports diplomacy, sees the centenary as a platform to deepen ties between the two countries. “Sport is a part of the free trade agreement,” he told The Indian Express. “There are interests from New Zealand and India to share, learn and collaborate on sport.”
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For Miskimmin, the connection is personal. His grandfather, Havilah Down, refereed that first international in Christchurch. “The message went around about these wizards from India who were so clever,” he said. “In the end, I think they had scheduled only two matches, and they added a third one. Mainly because there was a huge demand from the public.”
The fascination only grew. The second match in Auckland drew more than 18,000, New Zealand winning 4-3. For the third, which ended 1-1, more than 25,000 packed Eden Park. “There weren’t any grandstands, just the embankments,” Miskimmin said. “That tour had a huge impact on New Zealand. India returned several times through the 1950s and 1960s, and its style of short passing, pace and ball control profoundly influenced the team that eventually won Olympic gold in 1976.”
The tour turned a profit too, £300 for the NZHA.
Decades later, when India returned to New Zealand in 2009, Dhyan Chand’s son, Ashok Kumar, was the team’s manager. At a stadium in Wellington, an elderly man approached him. As a boy, he had watched Dhyan Chand play during India’s 1935 tour.
“He was in his late 80s and learnt that Ashok bhai was Dhyan Chand’s son,” recalled Romeo James, then India’s assistant coach. “He told Ashok bhai, ‘I’ll show you a hockey stick your father gifted me.’”
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The next day, he returned with the stick, carefully preserved in a frame. “Ashok bhai asked if he could have it,” James said. “He smiled and replied, ‘Though you may be his son, I cannot give it to you. It was given to me by one of the greatest players in the world’.”
Ashok Kumar still gets emotional recounting the story. “It shows the affection people had for him,” he said.
