Nethra Sailesh, Pune
India has sent a record 21-member contingent for shooting to the Paris Olympics, exceeding the 15 athletes sent to the Tokyo Olympics. Leading the contingent is former Youth Olympics champion Manu Bhaker who became the first female athlete to win gold at the Youth Olympic Games. Returning Olympians Elavvenil Valarivan, Anjum Moudgil and Aishwariya Pratap Singh Tomar will also be competing this year.
The shooting events will be held at Châteauroux, a city about 270 km away from Paris. Indian shooters will be staying away from the main Olympic village. Qualifications for the event will not be broadcast, live streaming of the medal events will be available live on Jio Cinema and Sport 18 network TV Channels in India. The shooting games have been scheduled from July 27 to August 5.
This year, the Indian shooters will compete in all the 15 medal events in shooting at the Paris Olympics. The events include the men’s 10m air pistol, women’s 10m air pistol, men’s 25m rapid fire pistol, women’s 25m pistol, and 10m air pistol mixed team. In the rifle events, they will participate in the men’s 10m rifle, women’s 10m air rifle, women’s 50m rifle 3 positions, men’s 50m rifle 3 positions and 10m air rifle mixed team. In shotgun events, Indian shooters will compete in men’s trap, women’s trap, men’s skeet, women’s skeet, and skeet mixed team.
India has won 4 medals altogether in shooting at the Olympics. Our first historic win was at the Athens 2004 Olympics when Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore won a silver medal in double trap shooting. This was followed by Abhinav Bindra’s notable gold medal win at the Beijing 2008 Olympics in Men’s 10m Air Rifle. This made him the first Indian to win an individual gold Olympic medal. At the London 2012 Olympics, we witnessed a double victory with Gagan Narang winning a bronze in Men’s 10m Air Rifle in London 2012 and Vijay Kumar securing a silver medal in the 25m Rapid Fire Pistol.
As of July 27, Manu Bhaker shot 580 at the 10m Women’s Air Pistol’s qualification and secured her way to the final. The young athlete shows great promise to potentially end India’s medal drought in shooting.