Governor Ved Marwah plays a shot at the Governor’s Cup golf tournament in Imphal on Sunday. Picture by Atom Samarendra

Imphal, March 31: The Manipur capital came to terms with the “eagles, birdies, bogeys and taking a quick swig at the 19th hole” in the mid-Eighties through an enterprising soldier, Maj. Gen. P.L. Kukrety, who fancied the flight of the bubble ball on the manicured green.

A decade and a half later, Imphal is swinging to the “whack” of the club hitting the ball on the tee, thanks to Maj. Gen. Kukrety’s initiative of forming the Imphal Golf Club. The fairway was developed in the Assam Rifles complex at Kangla in the heart of the capital township.

The monopoly of high-ranking officials of Assam Rifles and the Raj Bhavan over the golf course was broken when the club organised the Governor’s Cup golf tournament in the late Eighties. However, the tournament hit rough weather after two editions and it remained “defunct” for 15 years.

The game got a new lease of life with the formation of the Manipur Golf Association in October 2000 and it climbed the popularity chart in a short time. The association also breathed life into the Governor’s Cup by holding the third edition jointly with the Assam Rifles at the Manipur Custodian Golf Course. Twenty-three golf enthusiasts, including four women, participated in the tournament.

The association owns a mini training golf course with four holes at the Khuman Lampak sports complex, while the nine-hole Manipur Custodian Golf Course is located inside the 12 Assam Rifles complex in Mantripukhri. The state does not have a full-fledged course with 19 holes.

Manipur’s golfers made their tournament debut outside the state in the Punjab National Games. Three competitors, including a woman, also participated in the Assam amateur golf championship in Assam’s oil-town of Digboi in January. Secretary of the Manipur Golf Association, Salam Santoshkumar, and his teammate Moirangthem Rachandra bagged the best gross and best bogey titles in the championship.

Santoshkumar told The Telegraph that golf sustains tourism, hence development of the game is a must for promotion of the tourism sector in the state. The state golf association has requested two government departments to provide at least 80 acres of land for a full golf course.