A derby not for the faint-hearted!

Updated On: 05 February, 2024 07:04 PM IST | Mumbai | Srijanee Majumdar

This was the 393rd meeting of the two sides - with East Bengal having won 139 games and Mohun Bagan boasting of 128 derby wins to date

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Teams in action (Pic:@mohunbagansg/X)

It is most likely that you would assume an Indian sporting fixture that regularly attracts more than a lakh could only be a game of cricket. Certainly not in Kolkata, where on Saturday, hundreds of thousands thronged the city`s Salt Lake Stadium for the latest instalment of the `Boro Derby`, as East Bengal locked horns with Mohun Bagan in what might well be the most heavily-attended and historically significant derby one has never heard of.

In fact, there appears to be a bubbling effervescence escaping the stadium each time the two take the field that makes fans want to jump the ticket barriers to get in. “The first derby game I attended was in January 1998. Four of us went, my dad and I the maroons, and my uncle and my cousin the reds. At the half time, with Bagan winning 1-0 and our stand being a sea of green and maroon scarves, everything seemed so sweet. At the final whistle, Bagan had won 2-1, I remember I was in floods of tears and inconsolable. I was only six at that time,” Prasun Sengupta told Mid-Day.

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