India becoming golf hot bed?
India seems to be becoming a hotbed of golf course activity – and PGA Tour pros are getting in on the designs.
Colin Montgomerie and Vijay Singh are two big stars to cash in on the trend, adding their names to a who’s who of golfers with course interests in the booming country.
“There’s certain meetings this week while I’m here and we hope to do that,” Montgomerie said, when asked if he planned to design courses in India.
“We look forward to it.”
Singh, a Fijian of Indian heritage, said he already had plans to design a signature course in the tourist state of Goa.
“Hopefully I can get a lot more opportunities to design golf courses here,” he said.
“I’m doing a few more in the Asian region but here in India, that’s the first one and probably after that we’ll see if we can get some more.”
The Classic was held on the Arnold Palmer-designed DLF Golf and Country Club here, while Jack Nicklaus and Greg Norman have also charted courses and Nick Faldo and Ernie Els have layouts in the works.
Well, nobody can blame these guys for taking a paycheck. The question, as is always the case, is what level of involvement will they have? There aren’t any regular tour stops in India – and for Els and Singh, tournament golf is still a high priority. How they will balance family, tournament golf and golf courses in India would seem fairly tricky. Especially with the difficulty of putting together a piece of property large enough for a golf course.
According to Narain, one of the main difficulties in establishing courses is buying land, which is usually held in small parcels by various families.
“If you want to put together 200 acres, you might have to negotiate with 200 owners,” he said. “It can take up to five or 10 years sometimes.”
Negotiations can turn ugly, as in 2002 when thousands of homes in Chandigarh were knocked down to make way for a golf course. One man died after setting fire to himself in protest, reports said.
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Negotiating with up to 200 land owners up to 10 years. And having someone commit suicide because of negotiations is nuts. How much are the fees to play after all that?“