Kathmandu, November 29

Qatar Airways Open Golf Tournament is slated for this week at the Gokarna Golf Club, with the two-way air ticket to Edinburgh and a dream opportunity of playing at the St Andrew’s to be won.

Around 100 golfers across the country will take part in the prestigious event sponsored by Qatar Airways and the overall champion will win the air tickets to Edinburgh. “We will award the winner with the air tickets to Scotland with a hope that the golfer goes to the St Andrew’s and play a round of golf at the Mecca of the sport,” said Deepak Acharya, Senior Golf Director at the Gokarna Forest Resort.

Country Manager at Qatar Airways Jayaprakash Nair said he was happy with the association with the sport and the Gokarna Forest Resort. “As we are star airlines, we are more than happy to be associated with brands,” said Nair. “We are the sponsors of Spanish giants Barcelona and have also sponsored a Saudi Arabia team,” he added.

“Nepal is a destination where we can develop adventure and up-market tourism and golf is one of them. There are many golfers in the Middle East and Europe and we just need to facilitate them to bring here to play golf,” said Nair, adding that he was ready to help Nepali golf by whatever means he could. “This is an amateur tournament and we are ready to be associated for bigger tournaments if approached with concrete plans,” Nair added.

The tournament features overall, women, gross, senior, junior categories apart from field prizes in longest drive, closest-to-the-pin and most birdies awards. Eight women and 12 junior golfers will complete their rounds on Friday, while the remaining golfers will compete on Saturday. “As of now, 100 golfers have registered their entries and the number might go slightly up,” said Acharya. “We would like to thank Qatar Airways for their generous support for providing us with the perfect platform in promoting golf in the country,” he added.

Regarding the professional event mentioned by Nair, Acharya said that he would work towards preparing the plan. “The announcement is a welcome gesture from Qatar Airways as they are willing to sponsor a big tournament. We will start our home work and prepare a concrete plan on this,” Acharya added.