Men dominate golfing in Meghalaya, but Shillong Golf Course is maintained by a team of women, says Aafaque Aslam
AS THE picturesque Shillong Golf Course prepares to host the first professional gold tournament in nine years, a team of workers is ensuring the players have the best green surface to tee off.
The Professional Golf Tour of India (PGTI), the official sanctioning body of professional golf in India, is all set to make its debut in Meghalaya with the inaugural Chief Minister’s Meghalaya Open Golf at the Shillong Golf Club from November 12-15.
While the course awaits the golfers, the workers are leaving no stone unturned to prepare the course. One of them is Rida Kharkamni, 48, who is looking after the maintenance of the golf course for last 13-14 years.
Over the years, she has never compromised with her duty, which starts early morning. Her job is to ensure that the course stays well manicured.
Kharkamni said that she and her team of 12 members are putting in that extra bit to maintain the course since they want the participants of the upcoming tournament to be impressed after they arrive in Shillong.
Kharkamni’s team has seven women and five men.
She admitted that maintaining the course is a challenge because of the onslaught of visitors. “People come here with families and they literally turn it into a picnic spot and then many young boys come here and play all sorts of sports here which is disheartening,” she said.
The insensitive people, however, do not deter her and her team. They go about their job with commitment, concentrating on the fairways, tuborg green and other ares of the course.
But Kharkamni resented the low pay. “I started working here for Rs 800 a month. It has not increased much in all these years, but I love this course too much to not work,” she said.
Madan Chettri, a member of the maintenance team, said the commitment comes from the pride of working on one of Meghalaya’s best known natural assets and they don’t want to compromise on its name and fame.
Much of the maintenance on Shillong Golf Course was being done manually until the team was given mechanised implements a few weeks ago. These include the Greensmaster1000. An executive of the firm that provided it said he had never seen a woman ‘man’ the Greensmaster1000 on any other golf course.
The tournament’s general manager (operations) Lam Warjri was appreciative of Kharkamni’s team. “They are trying their best despite the limited resources,” he said, adding he believed the tournament would open up new avenues for golf in Meghalaya.
“The tournament should also provide investment opportunities, since organising a tournament of this stature is expensive,” Warjri said
The PGTI tournament is expected to feature some leading professionals from across India and beyond. The prize purse of Rs 40 lakh will be the highest ever for an event in the Northeast. So far, 125 golfers from India, Srilanka, Bangladesh and Nepal have confirmed their participation. Twelve golfers from Meghalaya including four amateurs are also participating .
Golf was brought to Shillong in 1898 by a group of British civil service officers who initially constructed a nine-hole course at Laban. After World War I, Shillong gained popularity as a golf resort for European golfers from East Bengal and Calcutta and the present 18-hole course with its picturesque club house was inaugurated in 1924.
The layout of this course was done by Captain Jackson and CK Rhodes, whose primary focus was on preserving the natural beauty of the area.