While it may never upstage cricket, the royal sport of polo is making a comeback in Pakistan. Beena Sarwar of Inter Press Service reports.

LAHORE: Polo, the snobbish sport of princes and former colonial masters, is witnessing a grand revival in Pakistan despite the poverty of its villages' and the violence of its cities.

Banks, transnationals and other big companies find that sponsorship of polo tournaments. teams and individual players provides them public relations leverage in the exclusive circles of the rich.

The renewed popularity of polo is also related lo the in-lerest of Asif Zardari. Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto's husband. in the game that involves driving a ball through a goal using a long-handled mallet while mounted on horseback.

Tlie Prince Consort' or the First Husband', as ajsection ol the local-press has dubbed Zardari, has even imported fils own coach from Argentina for private lessons.

The prime minister's official residence in Islamabad has a sprawling polo field behind it and several horses in its stables. This has provided ammunition for political opponents of tht Prime Minister who dismiss Zardari as a "playboy".

But the sport is also reinforcing the sharp divide between the rich and the poor in the country by etching the iwivileged into an elitist circle that denies outsiders entry.

In the plains, the polo season is restricted to the cooler months between October and April. Ixit it is played almost all year round tn the milder northern areas.

It is particularly popular in the valleys of the Hindukush mountains bordering Central Asia where the game origi na tec I centuries ago.

Legend has it that the fierce central Aslan tribesmen used the skulls of slain enemies instead of the polo ball.

Today, their descendants scorn "soft and English embellishments" like pads, knee-high boots and helmets.

Their uninhibited styles of playing is exhibited at the annual polo festival at the Shandur Pass, some 3.900 metres above sea level, between the former princely states of Chitral and Gilgit.

The audience recently included the prime minister and her husband who watched the game amid a sea of orange, pink and red. tents set up against the stunning backdrop of jagged snow-covered peaks and glaciers melting into" green lakes.

But residents of the area are not all that keen on seeing ihe polo fans flocking to the yearly event.

"There, is no development here, no jobs, sometimes, not even enough to eat," says one Chitral resident. These rich people will come and watch and leave. What difference will it make to us?”

Chitral's assistant commissioner Shehryar Sarwar agrees. 'The Shandur festival is all glitz and glamour, but the real thing is a different ball game."

Sarwar explains: "Polo Is a passion with/the Chitral residents. almost a religion, but one which few can afford to practice.” In a poor region, the economics of the game force most people to remain spectators. he says.

The government now funds the Chitral Polo Association and maintains the polo grounds. But the payment of US$65 to each player for a tournament besides the limited prize money for winning is not sufficient to provide a living.

The prohibitive costs of the profligate sport have restricted

it to those who can afford to buy and maintain horses, rent Stables ahd hire trainers and stable boys.

A reasonably healthy horse costs a minimum of USS 1.000 while maintaining and feeding comes to an additional ‘ US$300 a month. The total amount is way above the annual incomes of most of the people in this developing £outh Asian nation.

Little wonder then that only the families of the erstwhile chieftains of Chitral can afford to play the game today.

’’Polo is for the elite and the high class business families what golf used to be,” says Hasan Noon, a young banker in Lahore

"People sit and watch the game and talk business and it is also a great family outing.”

Polo has a certain snob value that no other game here enjoys.

Horse owners and polo players form a small, tightly knit clique going back several generations.

Horse breeding and stud farms have traditionally remained the preserve of the most privileged in the land: feudal families and the army. Retired army officers with at, least one good breeding mare can get the acreage to start a stud farm from which horses for the army are selected.

After that, open markets are held in spring where untrained horses can be picked up for anywhere between US$1,000 and US$2,000.

This year. Pakistan's polo aficionados were already enjoying the start of the national open championships in the exclusive Lahore Polo Club by late March — screened, naturally. from the hoi polloi by a thicket of trees.