January 7, 2006	Saturday	Zilhaj 6, 1426

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KARACHI, Jan 6: President of Pakistan Golf Federation (PGF), Lt. Gen Ashfaq Parvaiz Kayani, said on Thursday that staging of the upcoming Asian Tour after a decade would provide a breakthrough to the sport in the country.

Carrying total prize money of US$200,000, the 72-hole competition tees off at the Karachi Golf Club (KGC) on Jan 19.

The four-day competition would see approximately 100 plus top professionals from China, Thailand, Singapore, South Korea, Malaysia, India, Pakistan and other countries vying for honours.

Shabbir Iqbal, Muhammad Munir, Nadeem Inayat, Matloob Ahmed, Imdad Hussain were among other Pakistani professionals who would try to prove their mettle.

“Since coming at the helm of affairs in Nov 2004, it was my endeavour to bring the Asian Tour to the country which was a challenging task as it involves around Rs30m,” he told Dawn.

Underlining its importance, he said firstly, Pakistan would emerge on the international golfing map and secondly, efforts would be made to make it an annual feature aimed at making the game popular.

The PGF chief disclosed that plans for setting up a Golf Academy and a golf course at Islamabad were in pipeline. To be owned by the PGF, when commissioned in two years time, it would be the first public golf course in the country and would also house the PGF headquarters, he added.

The step, he said, was being taken as PGF mostly depended on private clubs as it did not own any course in the country.

Meanwhile, Ms Nessa Lee, Event Services Manager Asian Tour arrived here from Singapore to oversee the arrangements.

Earlier, he chaired organising committee meeting at the KGC to review the progress.

The meeting was attended among others by secretary PGF, Taimur Hasan, Lt. Col (retd) Safi, Sohail Rana, Asad I. A. Khan, Abdul Bari, Cdre Asif, Cdre Obaidullah and AVM Sabiul Hasan.