Prabagaran wins All India Amateur Golf Championship

Kandasamy Prabagaran of Sri Lanka won the 106th All India Amateur Golf Championship held at the Par 72 Coimbatore Golf Club over the past week. With this victory, he becomes the fourth Sri Lankan to win this coveted event. The previous winners were Pin Fernando, Nandasena Perera, and Lalith Kumara.

Prabagaran, having been seeded 11th after the stroke play qualifying round , played excellent golf throughout the match play section of the event and in reaching the final, had many tough matches against more fancied and experienced opponents from , not just India, but the very talented South African, Ruan Botha ranked in the top 50 of the world amateur rankings.

In the 36 hole final played last Sunday, he confronted experienced campaigner, Simarjeet Singh, who himself had won the Sri Lanka Amateur on three consecutive occasions in early 2000, but had never reached the final of the All India previously. In a closely contested match of see sawing fortunes, Prabagaran prevailed at the 35th when he went two up after both players missed the fairway and only made bogey. Prabagaran made 9 birdies in the match and it was his putting which proved decisive in the final analysis.

Prabagaran hails from Nuwara eliya and learnt his golf at the picturesque Nuwara Eliya Golf Club. He has been a regular member of the Sri Lanka Amatuer golf team in recent years touring India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Singapore and representing Sri Lanka at the Asian Games held in Doha last December. His previous victory in an international event was when he won the Sri Lanka Amateur in 2003.