Pakistan Rugby Union’s president, Fawzi Khawaja, is passionate for the sport. From his childhood Fawzi played rugby and over the years his love for the game transcended boundaries, from Karachi to various leagues in the United Arab Emirates, the amiable Lahore-based administrator has seen rugby generate a mass appeal.

“In the 1960s and ’70s Karachi was an altogether different city; expatriates were settled in a large number and every month the crew of ships anchored at the sea port sought some recreation during their stay. For sailors and their male supporting staff rugby was a real source of entertainment and with the help of the expatriate population they used to converge for games at the Clifton beach right behind Abdullah Shah Ghazi’s mausoleum,” the president informs.

Ever since the formation of the national rugby body, Fawzi has played a leading role in establishing the sport in the country. At present some 2,000 players are actively playing rugby.

“Lahore and Islamabad are the two cities which dominate the rugby scene in the country — the grounds are readily available there and the interest is somehow more than Karachi. Out of the active players nearly half are students of various age groups. They are the future and the national body is very keen on harnessing their talent.

“The youth will take the sport forward and make Pakistan compete at the highest level,” states Fawzi, while pinning his hopes on the growing interest in the game encouraged by the advent of local and international sport channels.

Meanwhile, there are many departmental and regional teams that take part in tournaments held across the nation, each province has an association that works with the national body. Fawzi reveals that the national team is made out of the players featuring in departmental and regional outfits.

“Teams like Army, Police, Wapda and HEC are the ones that actively participate in tournaments for both 15s and 7s rugby. The national players are part of these outfits while it is also heartening to note that in the past, professional doctors and businessmen have also represented Pakistan at the international level.

“Most of these players were extremely keen on placing the nation on the rugby map and it was due to their effort that we made it to division three at the Asian level and defeated leading teams of the region some five years ago,” he says.

Unfortunately the progress made at that time has not been followed through. The standard has declined somewhat and the national team was relegated to Asian division four after a string of poor performances last year. One of the reasons for the dwindling standards is the security situation in the country which hampers the efforts of the body of hiring top notch coaches for local players.

“The International Rugby Union is keen on supporting Pakistan and has arranged foreign coaches. However, they are not willing to give them security assurances of any kind. Hence none of the leading coaches is available for a stint here. It becomes extremely difficult to measure up to the rapidly progressing international scene in such a scenario which in turn results in poor performance,” Fawzi observes.

Another impediment in the growth of the sport is the lack of funding, a predicament that has affected every sport sans cricket in the country. The national rugby body relies on funding from the international body and Pakistan Sports Board. The grant from PSB is meagre and even that is broken down into various installments given out on a quarterly basis.

Fawzi though remains defiant. He feels that the national body is going to stay involved in the promotion of the sport and hopefully with more awareness a steady stream of income through sponsorship would become a reality.

“We have hope in the youth, the national body engages schools, colleges and universities from various parts of the country and generally the response to rugby is encouraging. Youngsters are willing to take up the sport and in the years ahead they would be the ones wearing the national colour. We have to believe in them and provide them every facility that will make their task easy,” he says.

The supremo dreams of making rugby a mainstream sport and while his tenure might not last more than a year, he is keen on carrying on even as a volunteer.

The task is an enormous one and Fawzi, his team and their successors would have to maintain the momentum and continue the surge if Pakistan is to make a name for itself in the sport.

For the years ahead sustainable plans need to be worked on, the first target should be to catapult to the top division in Asia.

However, that in itself is a mighty challenge considering the advancement of the standard of play of leading Asian countries.

Yet one must laud PRU’s efforts. They have a vision and are working hard under trying circumstances. Whether they would reap full reward of their work only time would ascertain for now though their concentration is solely on ‘Mission Rugby’. — Emmad Hameed