Volleyball in India is a game, which can be played both indoors and outdoors. Hitting a ball backward and forward across the net and scoring points in the process play the game.

Volleyball in India is a very popular game. Being very cheap it is played in all parts of the country all round the year.

Volleyball game has its origin in the United States and was first played in February 1895. But the first official volleyball game was played in 1986 at Springfield College. A physical education teacher named William G. Morgan started it by combining few aspects of tennis and throw ball to form an indoor game. He named the game Mintonette.

Volleyball in India was first brought almost eight decades ago. A few sports enthusiastic went to the other countries and got trained in the game from there. Then later in 1951, The Volleyball Federation of India was shaped when in other countries the game had got already well established. Before that Indian Olympic Association controlled the game.

The inter-state volleyball championship was held twice a year for men only since 1936 to 1950. And the first Indian National Championship was conducted in 1936 at Lahore. After independence, the first Indian National Championship was organized in 1952 at Madras (now Chennai). After that the game was organized every year for both men and women.

Volleyball in India is now played by various educational institutions and the armed forces as well as police showed their interest in the game.

Volleyball team of India achieved third position and the bronze at the Asian games in 1958 at Tokyo where the game was first introduced in that year only.

Two teams of six active players in each, play volleyball in India. The two teams are separated by a net where each team try to score points by throwing the ball on the opponent`s court under the restricted rules.

Volleyball is an Olympic game and the complete rules of volleyball are broad. Usually, the rules of Volleyball in India are like this: one team scores point by throwing the ball in the opponent`s court and can also gain point when the opponent team does a fault. Thus, when a team scores 25 points first, wins the set and the team winning three sets also wins the match.

A team can touch the ball for thrice before it traverses the net but only different players can push the ball in succession. Generally, hands or arms are used to hit the ball but hitting by any body parts was allowed legally since 1996 Olympics.

The Volleyball court in India is generally 18 metres long and 9 metres wide which is parted into two 9m by 9m courts. The net is kept 2.43 metres and 2.24metres above the centre of the court for men`s and women`s competition respectively. Again, there is a attack line which is 3 metres from and parallel to the net in case of each team court that separates the court into "back row" and "front row" areas.

The popularity of volleyball India made it the only game to make a permanent place in the South Asian Federation Games(SAF) in 1987 in Calcutta. But it is sad to see the lack of response in case of women Volleyball than in case of men`s. India came with gold medal in the inaugural match itself but in 1989 lost against Pakistan. In 1991 the Indian Volleyball team regained its gold medal in Colombo games. At these games only, women volleyball was introduced. The Indian women volleyball team showed its talent in the 1993 SAF games in Dhaka where the men`s team got defeated by Pakistan. But the women volleyball team of India is yet to prove its strong hold in the Asian games.

Many volleyball players in India achieved Arjuna award. Few of the names are: Palaniswamy(1961), Nripjit Singh(1962), Balwant Singh(1972), G Malini Reddy(1973), Shyamsundar Rao (1974), Ranvir Singh and K. C Elamma (1975), Jimmy Geoge(1976) and many others.

Jimmy George was the first Indian Volleyball player to become a professional and was regarded as the one of the best ten players of the world. This youngest Arjuna award achiever died in a crash in Italy.

Indian volleyball gave its best in the year 2003 when the Indian youth team became the first national side to win any Asian title ever at the Rajiv Gandhi Port indoor stadium in Visakhapatnam in presence of 7,000 audience and the big officials. The Indian junior team qualified for the World Championship at the end of the year 2002 thus giving joy to the Volleyball federation of India.

The volleyball game needs lots of body movements and high jumps and leaps. So, to be a volleyball player, strong muscle, and moulded limbs are main plus points.

Volleyball in India is one such game about which the country can boast of apart from Cricket. The Indian Volleyball team is inching forward to the top list in the world but still not getting the desired importance from the sponsors.

The game needs more publicity and awareness among all groups of people. The rural players need more motivation and to retain the good players from rural area also needs financial help. The authorities need to organize more international matches to attract the talent. The volleyball in India needs more technological and scientific training process along with an experienced coach who can polish the talents in the country. Once the Indian volleyball team gets full-fledged facility and training, it will be among the top rankers in the world.