HISTORY
The seeds for the creation of the BITS Sports Festival were laid down in the year 2003-04, when BITS, Pilani – Dubai shifted to its new campus in the Knowledge Village. Along with the several other newly formed universities in the Knowledge Village, BPD had just two sporting festivals in the entire year to look forward to during that time. These were hosted by the Skyline College, Sharjah and the Gulf Medical College, Ajman.
It was this paucity of inter-university sporting festivals in the calendar that led Mr. Rafiuddin, Manager Student Services for BITS, Pilani - Dubai, to come up with an idea to hold one such event at BPD’s very own campus so that university students from all over the UAE could display their athletic prowess in a background of healthy competition.
But this idea would never had taken part had it not been for the interest and enthusiasm showed by Prof. Dr. M. Ramachandran, Director of BITS, Pilani – Dubai. He wholeheartedly supported the idea of BPD holding its very own inter-university Sporting Festival and under his patronage the ‘BITS Sporting Festival’ was born in February 2004.
However, simply deciding upon a name for the event was the least of the organising headaches. There was the small matter of venues since KV only had facilities for Table Tennis. So, Mr. Rafiuddin took great pains to rent the Dubai Cricket Council Ground and the Iranian Sports Club Indoor facilities for the inaugural edition of the event. And all his work was duly rewarded as BSF 2004 made a stellar beginning. The response was great from all the universities, a total of 7 of which took part. The four day long event was a huge success all around and was thoroughly enjoyed by both athletes and spectators.
Over the course of the next five years, the BITS Sports Festival continued to grow in size and stature as one of the premier inter-university sporting events in the UAE. Each passing year brought with it a new change in the event. Newer, better venues were chosen, which included the Sheikha Makhtoum Indoor Sports Complex and the Sharjah Cricket Ground to name a couple. Top companies also began to associate themselves with the event and over the past few years BSF has had sponsors like Giordano, Sun and Sand Sports and ETA Trading and Shipping. And most importantly, the number of participating universities grew from 8 to 14 by the time the 2008 edition rolled out.
In fact the last BSF saw a staggering 600 athletes taking part in seven sports. The sports were Cricket, Football, Badminton (both Boys and Girls), Table Tennis (both Boys and Girls), Chess (both Boys and Girls), Volleyball (both Boys and Girls) and Throw ball.
The participating universities were a who’s who of the top UAE Universities namely, The American University of Sharjah, American University of Dubai, Gulf Medical College, Ajman, IITM, University of Wollongong in Dubai, Skyline College, Sharjah, Preston University, MAHE-Manipal, ECMIT, SZABIST, Al Ghurair University, University of Sharjah, RAKMHSU.