Weekend Special:Legend Peter Thomson

Peter Thomson - Australian Golf Legend on golfingindian.com discussing Indian golf and Bharat Ram's role

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By Shaili Chopra, Founder GolfingIndian.com

 

Golf’s history in India is long and old and the one person at the centre of it has been industrialist Bharat Ram. It’s his birth centenary this year and part of the special activities, his grand sons Ashish and Kartik organized an evening with the absolutely spectacular Peter Thomson. Thomson not only is world famous for winning the British Open five times but for India he is a very special man. He was the first winner of the Indian Open in 1964 and thereafter he bagged another two trophies on Indian soil by winning the Open twice again. The fascinating part of his journey is how Thomson used his popularity at the time to promote the sport in India and the rest of Asia. He is no doubt remembered for his flawless game but more for his effort to spur an interest among people in the region to start playing golf. Thomson in a freewheeling chat talks about the game in the country, his best friend Bharat Ram who helped build Indian golf and is a bit caustic about new age players always wanting to get tips from their caddies.

 

Thomson recalls that Bharat Ram built Indian golf and brought it structure. He was instrumental in building the Delhi Golf Club, which somewhat marked the golf scene in the capital region and for helping institute the Indian Golf Union, which for many years was the only golf body in the country. He brought the world’s best players of the time and encouraged them to play on Indian soil. This not only helped promote the game, it also gave a flavor of how India’s golf legacy (second only to Scotland’s) to the world’s top players then.

 

Bharat Ram and Peter Thompson became friends and the latter – a five time British Open champion – helped grow Indian golf in a meaningful way. Thomson was a star and everyone wanted his attention. Luckily the Australian legend, was driven by the idea of growing and spreading the buzz about the sport in Asia and further east. He spent time and energy investing in the sport here and his friendship with Bharat Ram helped him achieve that.

 

 

“He was the best man to go to if you wanted to help golf in India. I was in awe of him. He was so good and generous and loved the game so passionately and he knew everyone,” Thomson recalled.

 

 

Thomson was generous enough then to visit India several times and even played in the Indian Open, which he won three times, to encourage the sport in India both for pros and amateurs. Thomson was the first winner of the Indian Open in 1964. Working together with Bharat Ram, he redesigned the Delhi Golf Course. He would say in a conversation with me, that the course and its forest like terrain lent itself brilliantly to a course. Best courses are not designed but offer natural beauty that can be retained to make the course challenging. “It was fun working on it, though sometimes difficult to play on a course you have helped re-design.”

 

Thomson, now 85 still remembers his experiences at the Delhi Golf Club and his friendships that developed thanks to Bharat Ram. Thomson had brought the replica he received when he won the trophy in 1976 at the Indian Open, and he held it aloft to reminisce those moments.

 

Things in golf have changed since. There is more equipment, a lot more technical analysis but Thomson finds it strange that there is a debate around the speed of the game. He believes players are causing the sport to slow down. “When I was young everyone played fast. A round of golf in a pair was about two hours. Melbourne where I live, the final in 1947 Amateur championship was just about two hours. I remember one player was 69 and one was 71 but they finished it in good time. We can get back to that if the game insists upon it. Because now we are taking far too long to putt in and get the shots out of the rough. They are just too busy asking the caddie what do I know now (laughs).”

 

 

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