the-south-asian.com                                              SEPTEMBER  2002

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September 2002 Contents

 

 Environment

 Earth Summit 2002
 - a factfile
 Earth Issues 1992 - 2002
 Summit Hopes & Failures
 Points of View

 Lifestyle

 India's Wine Industry

 Sports
 Women Golfers

 Health

 Stroke - recognition &
 prevention

 
 Architecture

 Rashtrapati Bhavan

 Women's Issues

 Gender & Disaster
 Management

 Visual Arts

 Purkayastha - photographing
 Ladakh

 Around us

 Coffee-Break

 Indo-Pak mountaineers for
 Peace

 Coke paints red on Himalayas

 The surviving Mughals

 The plight of HSPs i.e.
 Highly Sensitive Persons

 Brown Cloud over South Asia
 

 
 Books

 'Bapi- the love of my life'
 Anoushka Shankar

 'Knock at Every Alien Door'
 - Serialization of an
 unpublished novel by
 Joseph Harris - Chapter 8

the craft shop

the print gallery

Books

Silk Road on Wheels

The Road to Freedom

Enduring Spirit

Parsis-Zoroastrians of India

The Moonlight Garden

Contemporary Art in Bangladesh

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However, women's golf in India is as yet in its infancy and has a long way to go. Even as their male counterparts like Jeev Milkha Singh and Jyoti Randhawa have been teeing off and winning in foreign greens, women golfers are still struggling with the basics: Few sponsors, no professional tournaments, prohibitive cost of play, no coaches, no encouragement and finally no career prospects.

All these factors put together have left the 100-odd Indian women golfers in a Catch 22 situation. " In India if you are thinking of making a career of golf, forget it," says Kolkata's Vandana Agarwal, who won the All India Women’s Open and Sri Lankan Women’s Open in 1997.

Women who want to seriously pursue a professional career are advised to go West. Or, to be more specific, the US, where they can get excellent coaches and try to get into Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) tours. " Here the maximum you can achieve is a job with a public sector company," says Vandana who herself is an Indian Oil employee.

One of the top women golfers of India, Sanam Merchant from Mumbai says that the prospects might improve in a few years. " If must form a powerful lobby," says she.

As it is, Kolkata has just one women golfer of note and she is Vandana Agarwal. "I am not surprised that even school girls are not too keen on taking up the sport," says Vandana. " Apart from the Royal Calcutta Golf Course and Tollyganj club, the city has no other course. In any case a membership to these two courses is nearly impossible to get."

The situation is no different in Jaipur.  18-year-old Pragya Misra, from the Pink City bemoans " My father was posted in Chennai and I started learning golf when I was 13," she says. But once she returned to Jaipur there was hardly any opportunity to practice and improve her game. The local Ram Bagh Golf Course was nothing to write home about. That's when Pragya decided to shift base to Delhi. She has now enrolled in a graduate course in political science and is busy training at the golf course daily. "After college I will move to the US. Training in America is very essential and beneficial. If I do not get sponsors I will go on my own," says this determined player who may not have a big win to her credit but has been selected to the Asia Pacific junior team from India.

South India also does not have any woman golfer of note. " It is mostly centred around the north. Girls from Delhi and Punjab dominate the scene," says Irina Brar from Chandigarh, currently ranked number one in the Indian Golf Union’s ladies section. This 18 year old has held the top position for the last three years now. Last year  she won the Singapore Open, Sri Lankan Open as well as the All India Women’s Open. Just out of school, she is now all set to go to the U.S. " You need good academic grades as well as good performances to qualify for golf scholarship in the U.S.," says Irina whose mother too is an amateur golf player.

Irina feels that one of the main reasons why the women's golf has not blossomed is because many give up the game after marriage. " Once women settle down to matrimony their focus in life starts shifting. So, those who want to make it big must start early and achieve glory before they get married. No man wants to marry a woman who is always touring and practically lives out of a suitcase." says Irina.

However, Mayali Talwar is one of those lucky girls who is today counted among the top five golfers in the country. " Yes I was very lucky as my father is a member of the Delhi Golf Club. But many other potentially good players do not have the privilege and their talent is wasted because of  lack of resources," she says.

Says Chandigarh's top-rated Parinita Grewal, " To lift the women's game one must have trained coaches, reasonably priced equipment and easy access to golf courses. Only then can we become world level."

Meanwhile, 26 year old Shruti Khanna, one of the best golfers of India who won the 2000 Sri Lanka Open is back in the game after a long break. "I am getting back in shape," she says. Playing since the age of 15, she went on to graduate form Rollin’s College, Florida where she had gone on a golf scholarship. But she feels that women's golf has not progressed in the last one decade.

Even as these top women golfers are now competing for selection in the Women’s World Cup Golf in Malayasia later this year, it will be the first time a women's team will represent India in the prestigious tournament.