Daily Times

LAHORE: The Balijee International Bridge Championship will be held from March 23 to 26 here at the Lahore Gymkhana Club Card Room. Addressing a news conference, Ihsan Qadir, internationally recognised tournament director, stated that after the successful holding of this championship last year, the organising team would be holding the much sought after bridge bonanza for bridge playing champions of the country once again. Also present of the occasion were sponsor Aijaz Ahmed of Yummy Milk Products and director media Khawaja Pervaiz Saeed.

Khawaja Pervaiz highlighted that the championship was being generously sponsored by Ajaz Ahmad of Yummy Milk Product (Pvt) Ltd in memory of his late father Muhammad Iqbal, profoundly known to the entire bridge playing fraternity of Pakistan, as Balijee. “The desire of the sponsor was that at least six international teams should participate and accordingly invitations were extended to teams from India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Lebanon, UAE, Kuwait and Jordan. But they expressed regrets and only two players are coming from India and a team from Kuwait. Ihsan added that the competition would include twelve teams from Lahore, eight from Karachi, four from Rawalpindi-Islamabad, one team each from Multan, Hyderabad and Abottabad. “Competition is becoming tougher year by year. Amongst the strong contenders this year will be The Teams, Hadis, Bilals and Data Steel,” said Qadir.

Aijaz said that the championship would consist of two types of contests: the Pairs contest and the Swiss Team of Four. “Trophies will be awarded to top two teams and top two pairs. He said as regards to application of rules it was clarified that the World Bridge Federation had done away with the appeals committee which used to hear appeals against the tournament directors’ ruling. “Now the tournament directors could give ruling at the table instantly on matters of Law. But whenever a judgement is required they go about consulting other directors taking opinion of other good players and then give a solid ruling.”

Hadis, making appearance after a gap, comprises of bridge masters like Khurshid Hadi, Kamal Shoaib, AR Allana, Javed Miran, Rashid Ul Ghazi and Imran Jaka. Five of them have represented Pakistan at many occasions. Bilals were the runners-up of the Pakistan national trials that concluded last month in Lahore. All other teams from Karachi have strong partnerships and are all expected to do well. Aces, who currently are the national champions, will be missing their main player Zia Naqvi who is out of country.

Defending champions Holdem, comprising of Uzair Kamal, Umar Aslam, Arslan and Major Hasnat, from Islamabad will also be in full swing to retain the crown. Aces have services of Ahsan Qureshi, Ghias Malik, Nauman Butt, Usaid Mubashar Puri and Junaid Said. Izo IV of Izzat Khalil, Silver Star of Taqi Imam, Tanveer Ahmed, Imran, Mian Tariq and Sikander Butt, Saga of Ghalib Bandesha and Major Assad, Bokhari’s with Muzzafar Bokhari, Sajjid Bokhari, Suleman Bokhari, Riaz Bokhari and Kamal Rana are all set to shine at the mega event. Amongst the women’s teams, Ladies Tea with Rubina Agha, Fatima Raza, Najm Abid, Shahnaz Peerzada, Goga Saeed and Yummy with Tahira Nasir, Tahira Liaqat, Fehmida and Gulshan from Lahore will be vying for top honours. A women’s team from Islamabad will also be participating.

Computerized scoring system will used in this championship. Each table will have a Bridge Mate (an electronic unit) which will transmit results to the server after each board and the comparison made at the server and result ready instantly. Screens will be used in the team event. So partners will not see each other at the table. Khawaja Pervaiz said that it was a big honour that Ihsan Qadir would be the chief tournament director of this championship.