Teeing off a message

Globally, golfers support hundreds of charities

Even as professional golf was somewhat in low key in India in the last few weeks, golf courses across the country have seen hectic activity with a spate of special corporate, promotional and charity events.

For instance, last weekend alone saw three events in the National Capital Region. While Malaysian Airlines sponsored an event at Classic Golf Resort on February 28, CII had its big corporate event at Jaypee Greens and CanSupport Invitational Golf, an event held to raise funds for cancer patients, was held at the Classic Golf Resort last Sunday.

The coming weeks will see greater activity as corporate golfers "" the target for all these events "" keep swinging away for some cause or the other.

If the CII golf was a networking opportunity for the top industrial houses, the Malaysian Airlines event gave the sponsors a chance to rub shoulders with the decision makers in industry.

Events have also been held to promote tourism, and the bigwigs even in the Indian government connected with the ministry have realised its potential.

Bureaucrats like Amitabh Kant, have been actively supporting golfing in various ways. Not only does he make it to charity events like CanSupport, but is also looking at events to promote tourism directly.

Says former pro Brandon de Souza, "Professional golf is a living for the players who play on various tours, but it is the corporate events that bring out what golf can do for business and society. Sure, pro events provide a chance for the sponsors to get to know the pros and interact with them, but in corporate events, it is pure business with golf thrown in as a pleasant add-on."

Till a few years back, only Tiger Sports Management was involved seriously in the game. With events now becoming more high-profile and client servicing becoming an important part of organising such events, many sponsors have started looking beyond clubs for organisation of events.

Professional Management Group, started by cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar back in the 1980s, has been organising corporate golf events, the biggest of which is the Signature Club championships in different cities.

International Management Group, too, does some corporate events, though the numbers have come down since their golf head, Rishi Narain, a former Asian Games gold medalist, left last year and decided to operate on his own.

Corporate series like the Air Sahara one in different cities, the Bharat Petroleum corporate events in three to four cities, the Merchants Cup backed by ITC in Kolkata are some of the premier events held in different cities.

The US PGA Tour is among the biggest contributors to charity. Events donate money to various charities of their choice and individual players have their own charity work.

Be it the Tiger Woods Foundation for underprivileged children, Phil Mickelson contributing money in the form of $100 for each birdie he shoots and $500 for every eagle for a charity which raises funds for children of personnel killed in special military operations and training. Kirk Triplett, Tom Watson, Jim Furyk all have their charity work involvement.

Tournaments on the PGA Tour, the Champions Tour (Seniors Tour for over 50) and Nationwide Tour collectively generated a record $82.8 million for charity in 2003. In the last 15-odd years, the PGA Tour donated more than $820 million and there has been an increase of anything between 10 and 15 per cent each year.

There are hundreds of charities funded by the golfing community in the US and Europe and the trend of high-spenders "" that's what top-end golfers are what with money-making pros and top corporates involved in the game "" is surely giving back a lot to the society in which they live.