Time to hit bullseye where it matters
SETTING TARGET With a poor track record at the Asian Games, Indian marksmen need to rise to the occasion and emulate their CWG success
If the shooting scene in India is all spiced up today, it is because of the people who provided the impetus for this mega success and are now the pioneers in the sport.
It all started with a determined army man, Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, who has today risen to the stature of Sports Minister and wants to make India a proud sporting nation. Rathore might be a late bloomer taking up shooting when he was 29, but his silver at the 2004 Olympics was a game-changer. Who would have thought that a brave soldier participating in counter-terror operation in J&K would one day become a role model for shooters.
A journey which started with the double trap marksman winning two gold — individual and pairs — at the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games saw him clinch a silver medal at the 2004 Olympic Games at Athens. His sporting journey ended in 2013 when he took retirement from the Army and joined politics.
Along the way, he won several medals, broke records and, most importantly, motivated a whole lot of youngsters to take up shotgun shooting. Abhinav Bindra and Gagan Narang carried forward the legacy in rifle shooting. Though Bindra was steadfast in perfecting his skills in 10m rifle, Narang forayed into 50m events with mixed success. Bindra’s unwavering dedication to air rifle made him earn the country’s most elusive medal — gold at the Olympics. He broke that jinx in 2008 Beijing and became the new hero of Indian sport. As the 19th edition of the Asian Games kicks off in Jakarta and Palembang, and a young team of shooters takes centrestage, there’ll be many who would have been inspired by these brilliant marksmen. It’s an irony that none of them, including the 2012 Olympic Games silver-medallist in rapid fire Vijay Kumar, will be there in 197 Palembang, where the shooting events will be held.
But India’s promising young contingent will be looking to carve out a niche. Traditionally, Indian shooters do well in the CWG, the precursor to the Asian Games, but since shooting has become such a mass sport, despite all its expenses and the red tape associated with procuring arms and ammunition, 63 there will be high expectations from them.
120 And one man would be more motivated than the others to perhaps end his career on a high, given that he belongs to same generation as Bindra, Vijay Kumar and Narang — Sanjeev Rajput. Three team medals in three consecutive Asian Games do not do justice to his talent. The former Navy man will have extra determination to do well in individual event since team events are not part of the Jakarta Games.
If the absence of team events in all disciplines has dealt a body blow to India’s chances of bagging medals — India did reap a decent harvest in team events, settling for baser medals behind China — a lot of individual events too have been shelved including 50m rifle prone (men & women), 50m pistol, centrefire and standard pistol, the last two events being the sole preserve of Jaspal Rana, who bagged a mindboggling eight medals at Asian Games, four of them gold.
Rajput and trap shooter Manavjit Singh Sandhu— competing in his sixth Asian Games — are the only two old faces in the men’s team and it will be up to the youth brigade to challenge the Chinese dominance. The Chinese simply take aim to shoot gold. Even Bindra could not snatch gold from the Chinese at the Games and this is where the likes of Ravi Kumar, Deepak Kumar (air rifle), Abhishek Verma, Saurabh Chaudhary (air pistol), Anish Bhanwala and many more in shotgun will have their task cut out. A tough ask, but nothing comes easy at the Asian Games. A gold medal will the perfect ‘warmup’ to the Tokyo Olympics.