Haryanabala’s Champions and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Sleeping Sports System

 

Musarrat Ullah Jan – KikxNow digital crator

In a dusty corner of Peshawar stands a government school — Government Higher Secondary School Haryanabala — where students have rewritten the definition of sportsmanship without a playground, gym, or proper shoes. In the Peshawar District Sports Gala 2025, these boys swept the field, defeating schools with far better facilities. They won eight first positions and four second positions, turning the entire event into a lesson for our sports bureaucracy: talent doesn’t live in files or funds, it breathes in forgotten classrooms.

But while these kids were sweating it out in the sun, somewhere in a cozy air-conditioned office, the sports department was busy preparing “policy drafts” — the kind that look great on PowerPoint but do nothing on the ground.

The students of Haryanabala train on broken grounds. Their relay baton is often a stick, their running shoes borrowed or worn out. Still, they dominate every race they enter. Meanwhile, the officials in the Directorate of Sports Khyber Pakhtunkhwa spend their time attending “review meetings” and signing “grant proposals” that somehow never reach the players who actually deserve them.

Ask a senior officer about Haryanabala, and you might hear, “Is that a new private academy?” Tell him it’s a government school, and his surprise will sound like an insult disguised as admiration.

Behind every medal won by Haryanabala stands one man — Badshah Khan, the Physical Education teacher. He’s not a “certified Level-2 Coach,” nor does he get extra allowances for “training duties.” He just believes in his students.

He trains them on dusty fields, patches up old shoes, and sometimes even skips his own lunch to buy fruit for the kids after practice. Yet, when the department prepares its annual report, it proudly includes the line: “Students of government schools showed outstanding performance.” No mention of the teacher. No recognition. No reward.

If this were any other country, Badshah Khan would have been nominated for a national award. Here, he might not even get a travel allowance if he wants to attend a district-level event.

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, sports planning often looks like a satire. Millions are spent on “sports development projects” that exist only on paper. There are “sports complexes” without coaches, “training camps” without athletes, and “budget allocations” without accountability.

Meanwhile, the real athletes — the barefoot sprinters, the young gymnasts, the tug-of-war champions of Haryanabala — continue to train in silence. Their medals are made of sweat, not silver.

The irony is painful. For every genuine sportsman in KP, there’s a “fake athlete” somewhere using the system for foreign trips or visa sponsorships. For every hardworking coach like Badshah Khan, there’s a consultant who writes reports on “sports policy impacts” — from behind a desk.

Had these boys been from a private academy in Lahore or Karachi, they’d be all over morning shows by now. Reporters would call them “future Olympians,” brands would sponsor their kits, and ministries would issue press releases full of patriotic slogans.

 

But these are children of Peshawar — children of public schools. They don’t have sponsors, cameras, or connections.

All they have is raw talent, which apparently isn’t enough in a province where the sports bureaucracy values titles more than talent.

The real question is: where is the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Sports Directorate?

Why hasn’t anyone from the department visited Haryanabala?

Why can’t the government support a school that’s outperforming everyone else, even without resources?

It’s not just about trophies — it’s about the message. When the system rewards mediocrity and ignores excellence, it kills the very spirit of competition it’s supposed to nurture.

The success of Haryanabala School is more than a story of victory — it’s a mirror. A mirror showing how the province treats its grassroots sports. The players of Haryanabala don’t need pity; they need partnership. They’ve already proven their worth.

If the government has funds to grant Rs. 2 million to a single “celebrity kickboxer,” it surely can allocate a fraction of that to develop school-level athletes who represent the real future of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s sports. But that would require vision — and vision doesn’t come through cabinet agendas or signature files.

The children of Haryanabala are running with all their might.

The question is: is anyone in the government running with them?

Until the answer is yes, our sports system will keep celebrating the wrong heroes — and real champions will keep running barefoot on broken grounds, unseen and unsupported.

#HaryanabalaChampions #KPKSportsReality #GrassrootsNeglected #SportsWithoutPolicy #Kikxnow