By Rahul Banerji
The second edition of the S.S.P. Chawrasia Invitational tees off at the Royal Calcutta Golf Club on Thursday with a full field of 124 professionals in the fray.
The Rs 1 crore event to honour the two-time Hero Indian Open winner will be jointly staged by TAKE Sports and the Tata Steel Professional Golf Tour of India.
Leading Indian names in the reckoning besides the event host include defending champion Manu Gandas (2022 Order of Merit champion), Rashid Khan, 2023 rankings leader Om Prakash Chouhan, last week’s winner Karan Pratap Singh and others.
Sri Lankans N. Thangaraja, Anura Rohana, and K. Prabagaran, Badal Hossain, Md Akbar Hossain, and Md Dulal Hossain of Bangladesh, and Andorra’s Kevin Esteve Rigaill are some of the overseas golfers participating.
Prominent names from the host city in the field besides Chawrasia are Shankar Das, Divyanshu Bajaj, Mohammad Sanju, Arjun Puri and Raju Ali Mollah.
Signal honour
‘SSP’ as he is popularly known is the second Indian professional golfer after Jeev Milkha Singh to have a PGTI event named in his honour.
The diminutive Kolkatan has a long list of accomplishments to his name and is one of only two Indians to have won four times on the DP World Tour and owns six Asian Tour titles.
Chawrasia represented India at the Rio Olympics 2016 and the World Cup of Golf the same year. He also represented Team Asia at the EurAsia Cup in 2016 and 2018.
Winner of 17 professional titles, Chawrasia received the Arjuna Award in 2017.
“I’m really looking forward to playing host at the second edition of this event presented by TAKE Sports and am privileged to have an event named for me. I want to thank Srinivasan H.R., TAKE Sports, PGTI and RCGC for their continued support of this event.
“With a strong field and perfect course conditions provided by the RCGC, we can expect a week of exciting golf. I’m also very motivated to perform well at my home course. I wish the players all the best.”
Fitting tribute
Added PGTI chief executive U.S. Mundy, “This event is a fitting tribute to the invaluable contribution made by S.S.P. Chawrasia to Indian golf through his extraordinary achievements on the international stage.
“SSP continues to be an inspiring figure for the next generation of Indian golfers and we look forward to some exhilarating golfing action as a strong field is set to stake claim for the big prize purse on offer.”
“The tournament is a true recognition of SSP’s outstanding achievements at the international level,” RCGC captain Gaurav Ghosh noted.
“This event will go a long way in inspiring more youngsters from the club and Kolkata to emulate SSP’s feats.”
The RCGC set up in 1829 and affectionately known as the ‘Royal’, is steeped in history as the oldest golf club outside of the British Isles.
It is one of the oldest nurseries of Indian golf and has staged several prestigious tournaments including the Indian Open and the All-India Amateur Championship several times.
The 7,014-yard course favours long hitters and inaccurate shots can extract a heavy price A recent women’s event saw none in the field even break par, and the several water hazards make this course a challenge to master.
Also read: Karan Pratap prevails at Kapil Dev-Grant Thornton Invitational 2023
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