KARACHI, July 5: Former number one Matloob Ahmed heads a list of six Pakistani professional golfers who earned the right to play in India’s professional golf circuit. According to details, Matloob and five other golfers recently returned from India after participating in the qualifying trials for participation on the Indian circuit in Pune.

Shafiq Masih, Akhtar Ali, Shahid Javed Khan, Javed Inayat and Waheed Baloch were the other golfers who competed in the Qualifying School in Pune. After two qualifying trials played over 36 holes and 72 holes, they all qualified to play on the Indian professional circuit.

Apart from the six golfers who went from Pakistan, another Pakistani professional who is now settled in India also qualified to play on the Indian circuit.

Faisal Qureshi, who is married to Indian professional golfer Nonita Lal and now lives in India, was the seventh Pakistani qualifier.

In the first stage of the trials played on 36 holes, a total of 124 golfers took part. The top 27 made the cut for the second stage of the qualifying trials.

The second round played on 72 holes featured 104 golfers from various South Asian nations including hosts India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Mauritius. The top 70 golfers qualified to play on the Indian circuit.

The Indian professional circuit includes more than a dozen major tournaments offering a total prize basket of 35 million Indian Rupees.

By virtue of qualifying for the Indian professional circuit, the Pakistan golfers can also feature in the Indian Open, an Asian Tour event offering a prize purse of US$300,000.

The next edition of the Indian Open would be held in Mumbai in January next year.—PPI