Balbir Singh Sr. to Khalsa College, Amritsar. Finally, Balbir got the permission from his family to take the transfer to Khalsa College in 1942 and began intensive training and practice sessions under Harbail's guidance. Later, Harbail coached the successful Indian national hockey team at the Helsinki and Melbourne Olympics. Khalsa College had four hockey pitches. In 1942–43 Singh was selected to represent Punjab University, which, at that time, covered colleges from a large region consisting of undivided Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir, Sindh and Rajasthan. The Punjab University team won All India Inter-University titles with Singh as Captain three years in a row: 1943,
India national basketball team attention as he was amongst the top 10 shooters there and became the 10th best pivot player in the tournament there. The late 90s saw the emergence of [Jaldeep Dhaliwal], the first Indian basketball player who gained considerable international attention. Jaldeep led India to a surprising victory over South Korea, one of Asia's top teams. In 2005, however, a player S.Robinson complained that the structure and support for basketball in India was still mediocre and government officials did not do enough to support the sport. As a protest, he retired from the national team. At the 2011 FIBA Asia Championship