In a small agrarian corner of Manipur called Andro, a woman barely four feet tall has spent over two decades quietly shaping India’s women’s football story. Her name is Laibi Phanjoubam — known to everyone in her village as Abok Laibi, or “Grandmother Laibi.”
For most of her life, no one beyond Andro knew her name. That changed when National Award-winning filmmaker Dr. Meena Longjam discovered her — not through a sports network or government file, but through a small newspaper clipping.
“I was shocked,” Meena recalls. “Even in Manipur, every football club — including women’s ones — was run by men. And here was this tiny, simple woman running an entire club by herself.”
That club was the Andro Mahila Mandal Association Football Club (AMMA FC) — founded by Laibi in 1999, sustained entirely on her own grit, her bicycle, and her handloom.
A Story Hidden in the Weaves
When Meena first travelled the 30 kilometres from Imphal to Andro, she expected to find a community club. What she found instead was a one-woman institution.
Laibi’s life revolved around two worlds — football and handloom. Through her weaving, she funded everything: jerseys, football kits, match travel, even food for her players.
Andro, an agrarian village known for its traditional rice brewing, had never seen a woman run a sports institution. Yet, for over 25 years, Laibi has trained girls free of cost, often cycling door to door to check on players and weaving clusters.
“She earns a little money by making traditional phaneks and shawls,” Meena says. “Every rupee goes back into the club. When funds run out, she rears pigs, grows bananas — anything she can do to keep AMMA FC alive.”
The Club That Runs on Heart
The girls of AMMA FC practise twice daily — at dawn and again in the evening before heading to school. When tournaments approach, they camp together at the club’s thatched hut, cooking their own food.
“There’s no fancy infrastructure,” Meena explains. “No floodlights, no bus, no canteen — just a field, a few footballs, and Laibi watching over them like a grandmother-coach.”
Even so, AMMA FC’s results are extraordinary. Over the years, nearly 150 girls trained under Laibi have gone on to play state, national, and international football.
One of India’s first professional players, Bala Devi, once trained under her, and a younger player from Andro, Nirmala, recently became a FIFA Women’s World Cup trialist — proof of what’s possible when belief meets persistence.
Keeping Girls from Vanishing
But Laibi’s real challenge isn’t competition — it’s retention.
In a conservative community where teenage girls often marry or elope early, she’s had to intervene personally to keep players from dropping out.
“She’s constantly bargaining with parents,” Meena says. “She tells them — if you want your daughters to escape poverty, let them play. Football is affordable, and it can change their lives.”
Many former players now return as volunteer coaches. “It’s like a family,” Meena says. “Once you’ve played under Abok, you never really leave.”
A Daily Life of Discipline
At nearly seventy, Laibi’s days still begin before sunrise.
“She wakes up early, sweeps, cooks, weaves on her wooden handloom, feeds her chickens, then cycles around the village,” Meena recounts. “She’s tiny, on that old bicycle, checking on the girls, on the weaving units — she never stops.”
Her home, a small thatched house, doubles as a workplace and community hub. She has never drawn a salary, stipend, or government grant.
“She doesn’t bend to anyone — not politicians, not officials,” says Meena. “She believes in voluntarism, in doing good because it’s right. She even calls herself a communist at heart — she believes in equality, in work for its own sake.”
Recognition That Never Came
Despite her lifelong service, Laibi remains largely unrecognised.
Still, she never complains. She continues to fund the club through weaving, with help from a few supporters — including Bikram Thokchom, a Manipuri man who returned from Dubai to help her build a thatched clubhouse.
After Meena’s documentary Andro Dreams premiered at the 54th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in 2023, awareness of Laibi’s work grew — but financial support is yet to follow.
A Legacy Worth Protecting
AMMA FC turns 25 this December, and Meena and Vikram are helping organise a Silver Jubilee celebration on December 25 — a friendly match and a felicitation ceremony for all the women who began their journeys there.
To Meena, the film isn’t just about football — it’s about one woman’s system of survival and selflessness.
“She’s a revolution in herself,” she says. “She turned Andro from being known for rice beer to being known for women’s football.”
In Andro Dreams, Laibi finally saw her own story on screen — and even travelled with Meena to Goa in November 2023 for the film’s premiere.
“It was her first time seeing the ocean,” Meena remembers. “She tried to touch the water with her feet. It was like watching someone see the world she’d changed — for the first time.”
A Film, A Woman, and a Dream
If Andro Dreams gave India its first close look at Laibi Phanjoubam, it also revealed the quiet power of documentation — how one filmmaker’s lens can bring light to years of unseen effort.
Through Meena Longjam’s eyes, the world now sees what Andro has long known: that a grandmother on a bicycle, with a loom and a football, has been building dreams for an entire generation.
Laibi
AMMA FC Players
Dr. Meena Longjam with the players of AMMA FC