The Beginning of Chikmagalur Golf Club
Introduction
Twenty-five years ago, A.B. Sudarshan looked at a stretch of forested land in the Western Ghats and saw a golf course. The land was called Karadihallikaval — deep in the hills above Chikmagalur, where five rivers ran through the undergrowth and coffee estates climbed the slopes. It was not an obvious setting for a sporting club. That, in many ways, was the point.
He gathered his family, fifty-one like-minded friends, and a quiet certainty that Chikmagalur — already renowned for its coffee — deserved to be on the world’s golfing map. Today, the Chikmagalur Golf Club stands on 82 acres at the foot of Mullayanagiri, an 18-hole course that has welcomed golfers from across India and beyond. The forest made way. The dream took root.
The Course
Mr. Phil Ryan designed these eighteen holes the way the land asked him to — working with the natural contours of the Ghats rather than against them. No two holes feel alike. Some open wide across the hillside. Others tighten between tree lines, where the fairway narrows and club selection becomes a conversation with the terrain. The back nine runs through coffee estates, and on still mornings, you can smell the plantations before you see them.
The elevation changes are real and they are unforgiving. The wind off the hills arrives without warning. The same careful hands have maintained the greens over many years, and that continuity shows in their quality. This is a course that rewards patience, and quietly exposes the lack of it.
The Scenery
Chikmagalur does not need embellishment. The Mullayanagiri range fills the horizon beyond the fairways. The air on an early round is cool and carries the scent of coffee from the estates next door. Birds cross your line mid-approach — not as an inconvenience, but as a reminder of where you are. Even the most competitive players tend to pause and look up at some point during a round here. The mountains have a way of putting a golf score in its proper place.
The Legacy of Our Founding Members
The club was built on trust. Fifty-one individuals came forward when there was nothing yet to show them — no fairways, no clubhouse, no course — only Sudarshan’s vision and the land itself. They backed it anyway. Many of them played the inaugural nine holes when they opened in 2002, and were back on the same course in 2015 when Anil Kumble, Rahul Dravid, and Javagal Srinath inaugurated the full eighteen.
These founding members gave the early years their shape and their spirit. They financed what others called a pipedream. They brought their families, introduced friends to the club, and quietly built the community that CGC still is today. As the club marks its twenty-fifth year, their contribution is worth naming plainly: without them, there is no golf course. There is only a forest, and a question that went unanswered.
The club they helped establish is now one of the finest in South India. The land they believed in has more than justified that belief.