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Hockey is the national sport of India. Hockey sports has made India stand tall and prove itself to the world, in spite of being under political suppression then. After Independence, Indian Hockey Lions roared with new found vigour and created havoc among the ranks of the opposing team.
Hockey is one of the many sports derived from pre historic man’s delight in stick and ball games. It is a game played between two teams on a field with  curved sticks and a small hard ball. Its birth place was Asia and authorities credit Persia with having devised it about 2000BC. Modern hockey was created in England. The true ancestor of hockey was Irish hurling. The first hockey club was formed in Blackheath in 1861. The first international match was played in 1895 between England and Ireland. In 1908 hockey was included in the modern Olympic Games. The most extra ordinary aspect of its evolution is that a game once so rough and unruly was adopted by women.

Hockey was introduced in India by British Army regiments and the game soon found favour among the native Indians. The first hockey club in India came up in Calcutta in 1885-86 and soon Bombay and Punjab followed and the first clubs formed there in Calcutta in 1885. The Beighton Cup and the Aga Khan tournament had commenced within ten years. It was mainly restricted to the armed forces, and it was the army teams which toured foreign lands as early as 1900`s.
The All India Hockey Federation was formed in 1925 with Colonel Bruce Turnbull as President and M. S. Ansari as Secretary. The Federation held its first National Championships at Calcutta in 1928. The IHF seeks to promote, encourage and develop the game of hockey in India and holds a number of inter-member tournaments and National Championship Tournaments.

List of major hockey competitions in India:

# Premier Hockey League