Gold….. or Gold Plated

ately there have been doubts on the authenticity of the Bandodkar Gold Trophy whether it is made up of pure gold or not with the Sports Minister, Manohar Babu Azgaonkar, assuring the Assembly to dig into the matter.

During the zero hour of the ongoing monsoon session in the assembly, Churchill Brothers SC President Churchill Alemao raised the issue of the Bandodkar Gold Trophy and demanded an inquiry.

Azgaonkar assured to order an inquiry in the matter and said he will move a note to Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar.

The Bandodkar Gold Trophy was all this while reportedly believed to be made of solid gold. For safety reasons it was placed in a bank locker since it was donated by the state’s first Chief Minister, Dayanand Bandodkar in 1969. A year later one of the country’s most prestigious football tournaments kicked off.

This trophy has the carving of Siddharth Bandodkar posing with the ball and was made by a goldsmith in Panjim. It was considered one of the country’s most expensive sports trophies until the emergence of the Indian Premier League in 2008.

The grandson of Goa’s first Chief Minister, Yatin Kakodkar, was barely five years old when the trophy was donated to the Goa Football Association. He believes that it was a gold trophy and feels that the proposed enquiry in this matter will clarify this issue. “It was one of the successful and leading tournaments in India during that time along with the Durand Cup, Rovers Cup, Stafford Cup,” he said.

After a long hiatus, on January 6, 2015, the GFA brought the Bandodkar Gold Trophy out of the locker from the Central Bank of India, Mapusa, to display it to the public during the Federation Cup in order to generate some interest prior to the Bandodkar tournament which they were planning to revive. After which the trophy reportedly never returned back to bank locker and now even the GFA members seem to be clueless about the whereabouts of this trophy.

While the former India goalkeeper, Brahmanand Shankwalkar, who on many occasions proudly lifted the prestigious cup is shocked on the claims that this is not a solid gold trophy.

“During those yesteryears everyone knew that this trophy was of pure gold and was very heavy. I had to hold in against my chest to bear the weight of it. Whenever the trophy was brought to the ground it was surrounded by guards. The Bandodkar Gold trophy was given to the winners barely for ten to fifteen minutes just to click photos. The winning teams were handed over a replica of the trophy to take home. My father was a friend of Bandodkar and he was told that it was a solid gold trophy,” said Goa’s first Arjuna award winner.

“I never expected such news of the trophy of not being solid gold. The trophy was last seen by me in a picture in one of the newspapers during the Federation Cup held in 2015,” added Brahmanand.

 In 2008, reportedly the cash-crunched GFA had proposed to auction the trophy to run tournaments but failed to do so after the displeasure by the Bandodkar family.

When contacted, the Chairman of Dempo Sports Club and Ex-President of Goa Football Association (GFA), Shrinivas Dempo, to find out more on this controversy, he said. “There was some discussion about this in the managing committee during that time but no decision was taken.”

“I have seen the trophy as a child when I used to accompany my father for the matches but I have not seen the trophy as a GFA president. Generally everybody was under the impression that it was a pure gold trophy,” he added. 

The trophy is currently believed to be in the custody of GFA but when Herald inquired, the GFA President, Elvis refused to disclose its location, “Why you want to know where the trophy is, to rob it? It is somewhere and is kept in a safe place. In short it is where it is,” was his reply.

“I think he (Churchill) and the minister must be joking. Everyone knows that the whole of Goa is getting looted and they think they can divert the people’s attention from the loot,” added Elvis.

Earlier it was known that the GFA President, Elvis Gomes, had kept the trophy in the office of the Goa Football Development Council (GFDC) where he was also a Member Secretary. 

The current Member Secretary of GFDC, Aleixo Da Costa, proposed for a thorough inquiry into this serious matter. “I heard that the trophy was kept in the GFDC Member Secretary’s chamber at Patto but when I took over, there was nothing. There are claims that it was a six-kilogram gold trophy but now it appears to be something more than what meets the eye. If it was not gold and they were not apprehensive of its safe custody why didn’t they keep it at the GFA office itself along with the other trophies? Why in a bank locker,” asked Aleixo.

The Bandodkar Gold Cup is very close to the hearts of several Goans and its whereabouts is now turning to be a mystery. Some claim the original trophy is swapped with a replica between the time when the tournament was discontinued in 1994 and only revived as an Under-21 event in 2016.

A book titled ‘Memorable Moments of Goan Soccer’ by Ajit K. Moye (M.A Economics) stated that Bhausaheb donated a handsome gold trophy, which was then valued at Rs 60,000. In 1969, the rate of ten grams gold was Rs 176 and today the rate stands at Rs 30,909. If the value mentioned in this book is accurate then the price of the gold content of the Bandodkar Gold Trophy today would be nothing less than Rs 1,05,37,159 comprising of nearly 3.40 kg of gold content.

But according to the minutes of the AGM in 2016, “the trophy, which was removed from the bank vault after 22 years weighs 9.5 kg with an ivory base of around 7 kg On evaluation, the contents of the trophy were approximately 60 per cent copper, 29 per cent silver and 11 per cent gold,” GFA president Elvis Gomes told the members.

A senior GFA member on condition of anonymity informed that the trophy is not at the GFA office and is either at the office of a Panjim-based club president or at the residence of one of his colleagues.

Another senior GFA executive member smells conspiracy after all members were not informed about the trophy being removed from the vault in the first place.

“All I know is that this trophy was of gold and what is in possession now is only a replica. Something is wrong as the previous captain’s claim that when they held the trophy in 2016 it was not the same weight as it was earlier. Why is the tournament called a Bandodkar Gold trophy and not just a Bandodkar Trophy?,” the GFA executive member asked on condition of anonymity.

When Elvis Gomes was questioned why the trophy was not put back in the bank vault after the tournament, he replied “What makes you think that the trophy is not in the bank locker. Whatever is of value is always kept safely. The trophy is GFA’s property and the office bearers are responsible for its safety. The trophy is made is such a way it is not easy to replicate”.

To cross check this statement made, Herald inquired at the Central Bank of India, Mapusa whether they were still in possession of the trophy. A bank official revealed that Elvis and a group of people had come in 2015 to remove the trophy and it was not returned to the bank ever since.

Herald tried to investigate and found out that the trophy has been kept in a room at the GFA godown at Panjim. This is the first exclusive look at the trophy after two years but its safety definitely seems to be a concern. How could the GFA office bearers be so careless and leave the trophy unguarded. Neither the floor where the trophy is nor the GFA godown has a security guard deputed. Neither there is a CCTV camera placed on that floor or in that godown. A national treasure was left unguarded for over two years. An informant also revealed that this GFA godown was forgotten to be closed and hence left open for an entire day.

Whether the original gold trophy was swapped with a gold plated replica between then and now or it was falsely claimed that it was solid gold all along with no one bothering to question the claim no one within the GFA or beyond it knows for sure what the truth is.