Fact Check: Indian football team didn’t play barefoot in 1948 due to poverty

New Delhi, Aug 25: Football in India has been in the news lately due to a FIFA suspension on the All India Football Federation for undue influence from third parties. FIFA also took away the rights from India to hold the FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup 2022.

While there have been scores of posts discussing the issue, one post has gone viral with a photograph of three Indian footballers walking barefoot on the field. The photo was captioned, ' this is the photo of the Indian football team playing against France in the 1948 London Olympics. The match was tied 1-1.

We could not win because our players did not have shoes. Even though they were injured by the boots the players of the French team, the match resulted in a draw.'

The post further added that the Indian footballers also did not have shoes because the government did not have money. This was a time when Nehru's clothes were dry-cleaned in Paris and he used to travel in a private jet with his dog, it also read.

FIFA banned India from taking part in the 1950 World Cup because you cannot play without shoes. After that India never took part in the FIFA World Cup. Despite this so many stadiums are named after the Nehru-Gandhi family, the post also said.

The post is distorted and out of context. OneIndia reverse searched the image and it led us to a tweet by the All India Football Federation posted on July 31 2021. "On this day, 73 years ago, the Blue Tigers played their first International match as citizens of an independent India, when they took on France, narrowly losing the match 1-2, at the 1948 London Olympics," read the tweet.

We also found an archived post of the Indian Express dated August 1 1948 which carried the report on India's defeat.

The report said that eight players from the Indian side did not wear boots while adding that this did not hamper their kicking ability. You could also check out a feature that appeared in Sportstar which wrote an article titled 'Braving it barefoot.'

In a nut shell when you read through these reports it becomes clear that the players played the game barefoot because they were more comfortable doing so and not because of the lack of funds.