Manu Bhaker bags twin gold medals at National Shooting Championships

Youngsters Manu Bhaker and Anish Bhanwala showcased the depth of talent pool in shooting when both fired their ways to senior and junior gold medals in the women’s 10m Air Pistol and men’s 25m Rapid Fire Pistol events at the 63rd National Shooting Championship in Goregaon, Bhopal on Tuesday.

The ISSF World Cup gold medallist Manu, representing Haryana, bagged as many as four gold medals in both individual and team events in senior and junior to add to her two gold that won earlier in the tournament. As a consequence, she also equalled the qualification national record on her way to an unexpected triumph. Commonwealth Games champion Anish also won both the individual and team gold medals in the senior and junior men’s categories of his event to stamp his dominance.

History is in the making as a record number of 7,760 shooters from across the country has thronged to participate in the nationals. It is a positive sign that shooting, as a sport, has grown leaps and bound in the country as so many shooters were able to qualify for the nationals despite having strict qualifying mark. India has already seen 15 shooters earning qualification at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, the highest ever from the country.

The 17-year-old Manu has already confirmed a berth at the Tokyo Olympics next year. She shot 588 to top the qualifications and equal the record set by Annu Raj Singh in the South Asian Games. She then shot a 243 to emerge triumphant in the eight-woman final.

Also read: With record number of entries at Nationals, it’s win-win for shooting in India

This is the first time when the 63rd National Shooting (rifle/pistol) competition is being organised at Madhya Pradesh State Shooting Academy. It is noteworthy that all the sports facilities are being provided to the players in the shooting academy which conform to the standards set by the NRAI for national and international competitions.