Golfer thrown out of her Royal club ‘for cheating in a tournament’ sues for more than £37,000 over claims of race discrimination

A golfer is suing her former Royal club claiming racial discrimination – after she was flung out amid allegations she cheated in a tournament.

Insolvency practitioner Rina Rohilla wants more than £37,000 from the Royal Mid-Surrey Golf Club – once captained by King Edward VIII – after it terminated her membership in 2019.

A member for 16 years prior, she had been accused of fiddling her scores in a competition by allegedly rubbing out and re-entering her scores on two holes to bring her total down by two strokes. 

She is now suing the Richmond, west London club at Central London County Court for £37,500 in damages – and an injunction forcing them to reinstate her as a member.

Ms Rohilla denies all allegations of cheating – and claims the bid to get rid of her stemmed from the club’s ‘unconscious bias’ due to her ethnicity.

The golfing enthusiast insists there was ‘an element’ of racism in the decision to get rid of her.

And she also claims she was the victim of a ‘stitch-up’ because other members saw her as a ‘bad egg’ who ‘didn’t belong’ and wanted her out.

The court heard that an unofficial ‘file’ of her ‘misdeeds’ was kept by club higher-ups – an informal term for a list of problems members had shared with them. 

The Royal Mid-Surrey is contesting the claim, denying accusations of unconscious racial bias and arguing that Ms Rohilla was thrown out because she cheated – nothing more.

The clubhouse at the Royal Mid-Surrey. It was destroyed by fire in 2001 and rebuilt by the end of 2003

Club chairman Chris Holt outside Central London County Court. The club denies all allegations of racial discrimination, maintaining that Ms Rohilla was thrown out for cheating in a contest

Judge Andrew Holmes heard Ms Rohilla had joined the club – which gained Royal status by command of King George V in 1926 – in 2003 and was ‘devoted’ to golf.

Ms Rohilla’s barrister, Josh Crow, told the judge that she had found herself ‘unpopular’ with ‘a core clique’ at the club, including elements of its management. He referenced emails where members of the Club’s Captain Committee said they want to ‘take on’ Rina but could not do so without ‘cast iron’ evidence.

One club member complained in an email about her ‘gamesmanship, the terrible way in which she treats her opponents and how difficult it is to arrange matches with her’.

Luke Edgcumbe, the club’s general manager, said: ‘I find Rina’s approach/attitude to golf very uncomfortable, and certainly does not fit in with the friendly nature of the club nor does it display what I like to think of as esprit de corps.’

Her expulsion from the club stemmed from her participation in the Harare 125 Bowl competition in September 2019, during which she played a round with two fellow female golfers.

The court heard that Ms Rohilla’s score was marked by opponent Eva Haupt – who allegedly rubbed out scores of six on holes three and six, replacing them with fives – allegedly at Ms Rohilla’s direction. They were using Stableford scoring – in which larger scores are best.

Ms Rohilla recorded the fives on the club’s computer – and was immediately challenged and accused of making the alteration herself.

She steadfastly denied cheating, but the matter was passed on to the club’s Captain’s Committee and then its General Management Committee (GMC), which terminated her membership after concluding she had changed the scores herself.

The process was led by ladies’ vice captain Beverley Mayes, with input from the ladies’ captain Diana Kyle and chairman Chris Holt.

Ms Mayes told the court she wanted a ‘clean-cut expulsion’ but insisted there was ‘no Machiavellian’ intent.

She said: ‘The level of cheating went to the heart of golf. You can cheat in lots of ways in golf but to change a card after you’ve signed it? I thought that was absolutely terrible and was a reason for an expulsion.

‘I stick by that because the crime was so bad. It’s not that I wanted it, it’s that I thought it was deserved for that behaviour.’

Royal Mid-Surrey Golf Club ladies’ vice captain Beverley Mayes outside Central London County Court. She led an investigation into Ms Rohilla’s conduct

Ms Rohilla initially was suspended from competitions and was later expelled from the club.

She was not provided with any of the evidence that the RMS was using in the case against her.

Mr Crow asked Ms Mayes: ‘You decided didn’t you, not to give Ms Rohilla any of the evidence against her apart from the two score cards?’

The vice-captain replied: ‘Yes, we decided not to do that.’

Diana Kyle, the ladies captain at the time, admitted during the court hearing that she failed to put her personal history with the golfer aside when coming to the decision on whether to expel her.

The court heard that the scoring issue was not even considered during the Captain’s Committee hearing that led to her expulsion.

Mr Crow argued that the decision was ‘arbitrary, capricious and unfair’ and done for an ‘improper purpose,’ motivated by personal dislike and racial discrimination.

He claimed the third golfer who had played with Ms Rohilla on that day, Sophie Warner, knew that the scorecard was wrong and had tipped off the assistant professional in the clubhouse, Dean Rodgers, before Ms Rohilla logged it, ‘to try to set a trap’.

Denying that Ms Rohilla had changed the score, and maintaining that Ms Haupt had made a mistake, Mr Crow said: ‘The only plausible explanation is that Ms Warner was intending to frame Ms Rohilla for signing an incorrect scorecard.’

This claim was contested as ‘impossible’ by vice-captain Ms Mayes. But Mr Crow added that club members had ‘smelled blood’ amid the scandal, prompting the investigation that he said amounted to no more than a ‘stitch-up’.

He alleged that ‘every single person’ in the club’s management was ‘immediately willing to believe the worst of Ms Rohilla’, who was seen as a ‘bad egg’, adding: ‘Not one of them gave her the time of day.’

The decision to remove her was made by Ms Kyles and Ms Mayes ‘in bad faith and for an improper purpose’ because of their ‘personal dislike’ for her, he alleged.

‘The moment the accusation was made, literally every person jumped to the conclusion that Ms Rohilla was guilty. In my submission, what happened here was outrageous,’ he said.

‘Ms Rohilla’s case is also that the personal dislike and enmity shown towards her was the result of racial bias – in practice, unconscious bias.’

Giving evidence, Ms Rohilla told the judge that, although she did not know all members of the Captain’s Committee, they came to make the decision with ‘a perception that I was difficult or people didn’t like me’.

For the club, Paul Nicholls KC asked: ‘Are you still suggesting that those who took the decision did so on grounds of your race?’

Ms Rohilla replied: ‘I think there was an element of it, yes.’

And when told that two members of the committee came from Indian backgrounds, she said that not once in over a century had a club captain been a ‘person of colour’.

Golfers pictured on the course at Royal Mid-Surrey Golf Club in March 2021. The club was opened in 1892 and has been given Royal status

She denied having doctored the scorecard, telling the judge she did not see the midweek competition, which carried a prize of £25, as important – preferring to focus on weekend competition without lowering her handicap with midweek wins.

‘No way would I change it,’ she insisted.

Mr Crow said golf had been the insolvency practitioner’s ‘entire life’ outside work – but that she had not played since her expulsion, causing her ‘severe mental distress, anxiety and disappointment’ and a ‘loss of reputation by being labelled a dishonest cheat’.

But for the club, Mr Nicholls argued the club’s committee was ‘plainly entitled to conclude that the claimant had altered her scores and thus cheated’.

He said: ‘The claimant has not adduced any evidence to support the proposition that those who made the decision were actuated by personal dislike or her ethnicity.

‘There was some concern expressed about her former conduct, but that is neither personal dislike nor (anything to do with her) ethnicity.

‘The allegation here is of a decision positively caused by a person’s race. That is something which would require clear evidence, which it is suggested is wholly missing.

‘The defendant’s case is that the claimant was expelled because the GMC concluded that she had altered her scores.

‘There is no reason to believe that a person of a different race would have been treated differently.

‘The defendant’s case is that that claim, like the claim based on personal dislike, lacks any foundation. More than that…it is just untrue.’

The trial continues.