Then I Blessed Them With That Polo

Fortunately, in the remote regions of Gilgit, Ladakh and Manipur, the sport survived, and it was in Manipur many decades later that polo was rediscovered and gained popularity among Westerners. The history of ancient polo may be controversial, yet its spread to the West is undoubtedly credited to India, where in the 1860s a British officer and seven British tea planters set up the first club for the modern game, the Silchar Polo Club. From there, the popularity of the sport caught on among British subjects in India, and eventually the sport was introduced to Europe. Once imported to the West, polo soon became a fashionable sport, especially among the nobility and in the army.