The raider approached the defenders, bouncing on his feet as he sized up the two-man opposition. He can consider himself lucky, as the ‘raider’ in any kabbadi game typically faces up to seven players at once. To score points, the raider must cross the ‘baulk line’ — located 3.75 metres from the midline — before touching an opponent and returning to his half of the court. He chants, ‘kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi…’ as the mics concealed under the mat keep a check on his breath.
The raider flails his arm, but fails to touch the defender at the edge of the playing area. He turns quickly towards the other opponent, but the latter is ready for him, as he retreats a couple of steps behind. Now the raider has to readjust his plan — 25 of the allotted 30 seconds remain. There is time, but then things change so quickly in kabaddi, you never know. The raider rushes to the opposite corner, but neither he nor his defender are able to outdo each other. The other defender, meanwhile, has closed in.
A few shadow battles play out, but the raider is wary of the ticking clock. He goes for the kill. He touches the defender behind him, but his left leg is grabbed mid-motion. He leaps like a gazelle but falls, and his falling torso is arrested by the other opponent. His jump, meanwhile, has helped him evade the guy holding his leg, and his outstretched arm misses the midline by inches now. The desperate defender leaps over the raider’s neck, locking him down. But the raider is gritty — he slides a smidgen and the tips of his fingers cross the halfway line. The raid is won, and his team gets two points. Just 16 seconds have passed.
As any kabaddi enthusiast will tell you, there is plenty of action packed in a short amount of time. If you were to catch a repeat of that raid on YouTube, though, you will be greeted with a screen freeze and, suddenly, the background turns silver. This is the moment the raider, Sandeep Narwal, leaps — a moment in time where he is not just a kabaddi player but also an ambassador for callisthenics. It is the kind of glitzy coverage this sport with ancient roots never got, until the Pro Kabaddi league arrived in 2014, that is.
The makeover was hardly the outcome that was envisaged for the sport. An examination of kabaddi’s journey towards becoming a modern sport reveals so.
Although it came to be known by different names and variants — hu-tu-tu in Maharashtra, jabarjang in Punjab — it was in the first half of the 20th century that kabaddi underwent “sportisation”, as some anthropologists like Joseph Alter described it. Alter observed that a standardised version of the game was pushed by “nationalist groups and State bodies to conform with international standards for rules and regulations”.
The first recorded public demonstration of a sport that was somewhat similar to today’s kabaddi was in 1911 in Delhi, at the Badshahi Mela — a fair held to celebrate the visit of King George V and Queen Mary. The inaugural all-India competition followed in 1923, but kabaddi’s most interesting demonstration was, arguably, carried out by the Hanuman Vyayam Prasarak Mandal at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. The performers were adjudged to be worthy of a Hitler medal for ‘best performance’. The mandal was among several popular initiatives in early 20th-century Maharashtra for the promotion of physical culture.
The pro-nationalist push for the indigenous game was intended to counter the countrymen’s fascination with Western civilisation. In fact, when Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru inaugurated a kabaddi tournament in Bombay in 1963, he endorsed the popularly-held belief that kabaddi helps in building “sturdy men”. Yet, after all this, the sport barely grew out of its shadows. Its image as a rural sport stuck; in marketing terms, it did not become ‘aspirational’. Although the Kabaddi Federation of India’s (KFI) forerunner (All India Kabaddi Federation) was established in 1950, little was done to modernise the game. It had remained a rather archaic endeavour for physical fitness, rather than sporting contests.
Interestingly, when the British public-service broadcaster Channel 4 decided to televise “new and different” sports in that country, kabaddi was chosen for its exotic value. Although it showed only for a year (1991-92), the game managed to grab the attention of curious viewers, who were amazed at the sight of sportspersons slumming it in the mud.
Fair to say, kabaddi remained on the margins of Indian sporting too. A much-recounted anecdote tells of KFI’s amused reaction when it was approached by the Mashaal Group and Star Sports with the proposal for Pro Kabaddi. It is certainly not a joke anymore.
E Prasad Rao is barely known by his real name. He is Kabaddi Rao to most. The technical director at Pro Kabaddi — he holds the same position at the International and Asian kabaddi federations — has become near-synonymous with the sport, with good reason. Rao has witnessed the transformation of the game — primarily rural by association and played in mud — to its now-fashionable outings in air-conditioned halls and matted playing surface.
“Today we have engineers and doctors playing kabaddi. At the recently held all-India university competition, doctors came out in huge numbers,” he says.
In his playing days, the sport’s recognition was mostly limited to South and South-east Asia. In fact, India’s sole gold medal at the 1990 Asian Games in Beijing came in kabaddi, the sport making its début then. Despite that, the Indian side did not exactly receive a rousing welcome on its return. “When we brought the first gold, very few people turned up to receive us. They could not recognise the team.”
Kabaddi Rao, of course, continues to champion the merits of kabaddi — a rare sport that pits an individual against a team, and awards points for defending. But there is one other factor that stands out above the rest: “It is among the most inexpensive games in the world. It is played in schools because only marking powder is required. It does not require a large playing area. It is more economical to play kabaddi than any other sport.”
And, yet, the financial stakes keep rising. Before the inaugural Pro Kabaddi campaign in 2014, the Indian team’s captain Rakesh Kumar became the most expensive player when he was bought by Patna Pirates for ₹12.8 lakh. Nitin Tomar currently holds the record, after being signed by UP Yoddha for ₹93 lakh.
The rise in players’ worth mirrors the change in the profile of kabaddi — one that’s led by the administrators and the broadcaster Star Sports. “To start with, the game play was prioritised to achieve strategy, planning and create fast-paced action on the mat. Introduction of a few rule tweaks, with the support of the federation, helped the sport garner mass appeal — Do-or-Die raid, Super Tackle and Super Raid reward more challenging plays. To make the sport appealing for television viewers, the field of play was modified to meet international standards, wherein the lighting was developed and coloured mats were introduced with live 3D graphic mapping,” says Anupam Goswami, league commissioner for Pro Kabaddi.
Taking cue from other sports, the league soon realised that its popularity had to be driven by snazzy imaging and marketable iconography. The screen freeze mentioned earlier is one such artifice.
“This game used to be played without shoes, but the introduction of mat and shoes have changed it. Even in schools, kids have started playing on a mat,” says Kabaddi Rao, on the wider impact made by the league.
Alongside the modernisation, the league brought with it a more scientific approach to the game. All teams have a physical trainer, a conditioning coach and a psychologist, as the emphasis grows on mental and physical fitness.
Interestingly, the technical aspects of the sport have also transitioned towards greater complexities.
“In the first two seasons, coaches were appointed and were given the players for their team. Now, coaches are searching for players according to the side’s needs... there is also a delegation of duty — separate coaches for defence and raiding. Coaches also have to scout for new talent, like in any other sport, and develop analytical and training methods. They are even dismissed if teams don’t do well,” Kabaddi Rao explains.
The higher financial stakes are bringing added pressures, as also forcing a shift towards tactical expertise and data-driven analytics. Teams look for information that can give them an edge over their opponents. Parallelly, says Rao, viewers will become more discerning as well. The players, meanwhile, are quickly adapting in more ways than one.
Patna Pirates’ coach Ram Mehar Singh has a story that he shares hesitantly, about a player who worked with him in Pro Kabaddi. The preparatory camp for a new season can stretch into 10 weeks at a time. It involves strenuous training, to build strength, muscles and stamina. Some players exit within a few weeks into the camp.
As Singh tells it, a certain player repeatedly sought permission during pre-season to go home for an emergency. The coach found himself in a dilemma, unsure whether to believe the player’s excuse or not. So he decided on an unusual solution. He sent a support staff member to the player’s home and the latter was found to be not lying, after all!
As coaches negotiate the new realities of the Pro Kabaddi world, Singh has a pet peeve. “Our work is not limited to just training anymore.”
The former Asian Games gold medallist has not only trained Patna Pirates for three straight Pro Kabaddi title wins, but has also been heavily involved in player scouting and recruitment. From changes in financial support to fitness routines and dietary requirements, Singh is seeing big changes from his own playing days. “The fitness levels were high even in the past. But it was down to the player then. Now, the mindset is different. A player thinks that a coach should listen to him when he does not want to be pushed harder in training. I’m aware of the load on them and we train them accordingly... [But] Some players just do not rest enough. They are on TV, internet throughout the day. Food supplements didn’t exist back then... doodh (milk), dahi (curd), ghee and makkhan (butter) were sought after. Today the focus is on diet charts, proteins, carbohydrates... coaches and players demand the best diet from the owners now.”
When Singh began playing kabaddi in Std VI, cricket used to be on the telly most of the time. Now, his colleagues and family wait for telecasts of the Pro Kabaddi matches. In and around his hometown, Bhiwani (Haryana), 15-20 kabaddi training academies have come up in the last three years, he says. A far cry from the time the Arjuna awardee learnt to play the game from his family elders.
Kabaddi Rao recently conducted a competition in Singh’s home state, with prize money of ₹1 crore. He contrasts this with an earlier era where “kabaddi was the poor man’s entertainment”. Last year, Rao oversaw a talent hunt for the league teams which, he says, attracted over 10,000 aspirants. Finally, 150 were selected for a month-long training camp in Mumbai, under the Future Kabaddi Heroes Programme. Eventually, 62 of them were bought in the auction.
Even as the league expands its footprint, the players are still getting used to the media spotlight. Those contacted for this article struggled to string a few sentences together. This poses a problem, as raising the media profile of the players is key to the league’s success. Puneri Paltan’s CEO Kailash Kandpal says his franchise takes extra effort to familiarise players with PR and media activities.
The successes have wrought a sea-change in players’ attitudes and social status. Nitin Tomar, the most expensive player, has broken away from his traditional moorings. “I usually farm my fields back home. My village (Malakpur in Baghpat district, Uttar Pradesh) is known for wrestling and I used to be a wrestler too. But kabaddi got me recognition, and my family is respected in the village now.”
The recognition continues to grow in spades. At the recently concluded Federation Cup (national championship), packed stands greeted the players in Mumbai — unprecedented for kabaddi.
League commissioner Goswami is understandably bullish. “The unparalleled growth of VIVO Pro Kabaddi has made it the most watched non-cricketing sports league in India — no mean feat for a tournament that came into being only four years ago. There were also multiple languages introduced last season to grow the regional fan base. In season five, the geographical representation grew to 11 States, with 12 franchises… VIVO Pro Kabaddi has not only set the benchmark for the growth of India’s home-grown sport but also shown the possibility for the rise of a multi-sports ecosystem in the country.”
But as a report in Scroll revealed last year, in spite of the 320 per cent increase in sponsorship revenue (boosted by title sponsor VIVO’s five-year agreement worth ₹300 crore), the rewards do not necessarily trickle down to the franchises. With the sport still being re-imagined as a brand, and the involvement of celebrities like Sachin Tendulkar (Tamil Thalaivas) and Abhishek Bachchan (Jaipur Pink Panthers) relatively limited, sponsors still need to be convinced of Pro Kabaddi’s marketability.
As Kabaddi Rao describes it, this is a high-risk sport. “If you commit a mistake, you lose more than a point. Four players can go at once.”
Even as a product, it is perhaps seen as high-risk. But no one can disagree that, in its marketable avatar, the sport has acquired a new life and recognition all its own. So much so that players are known by their skill moves, and terms such as ‘Frog Jump’ are no longer arcane. That’s a big leap beyond the game’s familiar cant of “kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi…”
Priyansh is a Delhi-based sports writer