In the sports room of Bengaluru’s Al-Ameen College, an attendant carefully dusted the photos he had dug out from an obscure storeroom. He was careful not to cut his hands on some of the frames that had cracked. Those that were not damaged had suffered still, from years of lying forgotten, faded and layered with dust.

He was curious about the sudden interest in these otherwise inconspicuous photos, but he kept his questions to himself, and continued cleaning.

“Here it is. One of the few remaining photos of that historic team,” said Mumtaz Ali Khan, the Chairperson of the Al-Ameen educational institutes, pointing to the photo of a football team.