The Indian shooting contingent participating at the XII South Asian Games being held in Guwahati and Shillong respectively got off to a winning start on day one of the shooting competition winning three of the four Gold medals on offer.
Rio Olympics-bound top Indian woman Air Rifle specialist Apurvi Chandela won the Gold easily in her pet 10M Air Rifle event.
Apurvi, who just got back from Europe after shooting world record equaling scores in competitions there, also bagged a double when she teamed up with Pooja Ghatkar and Elizabeth Susan Koshy to win the Team Gold in the event. The other Gold medal came in the Men’s 50M Pistol team event won by the trio of Omkar Singh, Prakash Nanjappa and Om Prakash of India.
Indian shooters win individual as well as Team Gold
In the Women’s 10M Air Rifle, India bagged the top three places in qualifying with Apurvi shooting 419.8, Pooja 417.7 and Elizabeth 411 respectively to reach the eight-woman final.
Their combined score of 1248.5 for the Team Gold was way out of the reach of the second-placed Sri Lankan Team who shot a total of 1218.4. The Bronze went to Team Bangladesh who put up a combined total of 1215.7.
Apurvi then ensured that she stuck to her Gold medal position in the Finals. However, Elizabeth and Pooja swapped positions to win the Silver and Bronze thereby ensuring a clean sweep for India in the event.
Apurvi shot 209 in the finals while Elizabeth ended with 207.1 and Pooja 185.9.
In the Men’s 50M Pistol, the Indian trio of Omkar Singh, Prakash Nanjappa and Om Prakash ensured the Team Gold yet again with a combined total of 1622.
The Silver medal winning Pakistan team logged a total of 1583 while Bangladesh won the Bronze with a team total of 1575.
In the individual event, however, the Gold was won by Sakil Ahmed of Bangladesh who shot 187.6 to out gun Om Prakash of India who shot a score of 187.3 to win the Silver medal.
The Bronze went to Kalimullah Khan of Pakistan with a score of 165.9 in the finals.
Here too, Omkar and Prakash had qualified for the eight-man final in the top two positions shooting scores of 550 and 540 respectively in qualifying. Om Prakash lay fourth at the end of qualifying with a score of 532.
