Bengal Football Academy (BFA) run by the state sports ministry started its journey in 2014. In the last nine years, the residential project which is situated at a place in North 24 Parganas named Khardaha, had to be closed for almost two-and-half years due to the Covid-19 pandemic followed by the lockdown. 

Presently the academy has 58 students including the two age groups of under-15 and under-17. It has four experienced coaches, Shantanu Guha Thakurta, Partha Sen, Surajit Mondal, and Ananta Ghosh. The students are provided a monthly allowance along with post-training food and kits. 

Incidentally, the academy is also building up a 28-member under-19 team this season after a selection trial and assessment program was organized recently at the academy ground. 

The key reason behind the initiative to build up this under-19 team is an opportunity where BFA under-19 boys will be able to take part in the Kolkata First Division league in the coming season following an assurance from the sports ministry as well as the IFA. The training of under-19 boys will continue in a non-residential program. 

The BFA was supposed to take part in the same Kolkata First Division League last season. At the last moment, BFA's name was cast out. The reason is still unknown. The new entrant in the First Division last season was Diamond Harbor FC, the club launched and run by Abhishek Bandopadhyay, a Member of Parliament (MP) and General Secretary of the state's ruling party TMC. 

Even BFA boys were expected to take part in the ongoing Reliance-organized under-21 Youth League east zone qualifiers. The opportunity was lost and the reason is still unknown. The new entrant in the qualifiers was New Alipore Suruchi Sangha. 

But the irony is that even after being deprived of required exposure, BFA's endeavor to produce quality footballers has not stopped. Nearly, 30 promising boys from the state football academy have got call-ups from different clubs (including all divisions) of Kolkata football. A couple of boys were called up in the national under-17 preparatory camp after BFA under-15 boys became runners-up east zone qualifiers of the under-15 I-League in 2020. The team could not participate in the final phase of the under-15 I-League due to Covid-19 and the lockdown. Even the team finished within the top five in the under-18 I-League also, defeating East Bengal and forcing Mohun Bagan to a draw. 

The promising goalkeeper from BFA, Julficar Gaji is currently in the under-17 national team that is in Spain on an exposure trip at the moment, training at Athletico Madrid. 

The BFA boys, after resuming training in July last year, have won Bengal's two olden knock-out tournaments, Nabab Gold Cup in Murshidabad, and lost in the last four in Kuladakanto Memorial Cup in Raiganj. 

CEO of the academy, Shanti Ranjan Dasgupta, commenting on academy boys, said, "Our boys need exposure. Unless they take part in competitive tournaments they will not mature. If we want our boys to get called up by Kolkata's premier clubs, junior national coaches, and the coaches who get appointed by the IFA then the boys must need to participate in enough quantity of serious matches which they are not yet obtaining. Now we are looking at the opportunity of playing in the First Division. If the boys can play then they will be hugely benefitted."

Dasgupta added, "I have planned to request IFA not to put the BFA in the relegation system. Rather they should be allowed to play. The IFA should treat the BFA under-19 boys as the AIFF-run Indian Arrows team was being treated in the I-League."