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What's the story?
In a proud moment for Indian sports, visually impaired swimmer Kanchanmala Pande became the first Indian to win gold at the World Para-Swimming Championships in Mexico.
In case you didn't know
The 26-year-old, who has taken part in the 2006 Para Commonwealth Games was chosen to represent India in the championships at the back of her outstanding performance in the IDM Berlin Para-Swimming Championships.
Kanchanmala was chosen to represent India in the 100m freestyle, 100m backstroke, 100m breaststroke and 200m individual medley at the championships in Mexico which commenced from the 2nd of December 2017.
Heart of the Matter
Earlier this year, Indian shooter Abhinav Bindra, who saw Kanchanamala's helpless state of affairs during her participation in the Berlin Para-Swimming, took to Twitter asking for voices to be raised in order to help Kanchanmala during the Championships.
His efforts did not go in vain as Kanchanmala got a lot of recognition and when she came back from the Berlin Championships, the government did its bit to give her state of the art facilities to enhance her training.
Interestingly, a Twitter user hailed Abhinav Bindra for helping out Kanchanmala with financial needs, in order to make it to the event.
However, the former shooter showed great humility, as he completely denied anything of the sort, and said that Kanchanmala had won the medal by herself.
What's next?
Going forward, Kanchanmala will be looking to build on this success, in order to bring more glories to the country. Having had someone like Bindra fighting for her cause, Kanchanmala has all the more motivation to take this forward this victory.
Author's Take
Kanchanmala has taken giant strides in order to get to the stage she is right now and it is indeed good to see her getting a lot of recognition and support which will only give more confidence to the other para-athletes in our country to strengthen their game.
