New Delhi: India’s Paris Olympics medallists will be back in action at the Senior National Shooting Championships starting on Wednesday. Swapnil Kusale and Sarabjot Singh will compete in the rifle and pistol events respectively, while double medallist Manu Bhaker – the star of India’s Paris campaign – will only take part in MQS (Minimum Qualification Score) section. The pistol competitions will be held at Delhi’s Karni Singh Shooting Range while the rifle events will take place in Bhopal.
Manu has requested she wants to enter the MQS section. It means her scores will not be considered for the competition. After a long break following her show in Paris, Manu and personal coach Jaspal Rana travelled to Lugano, Switzerland and worked on some technical aspects of her weapon at the Morini factory. She has been training at the Karni Singh range, but wants to take some more time before returning to competition. All three Olympic medallists, who skipped the October World Cup, are back in training.
The National Championships will be followed by selection trials and the National Games, scheduled in Uttarakhand from Jan 28-Feb 14. The National Rifle Association of India is yet to announce its selection policy, though it is learnt that there is likely to be some changes.
NRAI, it is learnt, is discussing a proposal where some elite shooters will be allowed to work with their personal coaches away from the national camp. Before the Paris Olympics, NRAI’s policy allowed Paris-bound shooters to work with personal coaches even in the national setup. It worked as shooters were able to spend quality time with personal coaches while the national coaches were kept informed of their training.
With most elite shooters preferring personalised coaching, NRAI might exempt some shooters from the national squad and pick them directly in the national team based on scores of selection trials and domestic competitions. A choice will be given to the shooters at the start of the season and they will not be able to switch midway through the season, according to people aware of the development.
There are many other factors that are being considered before NRAI clears the policy.
Another proposal being considered is to provide support to special talents who slip out of the national team ecosystem.
Competition at domestic level has grown every year and it has been often felt that once a talented shooter is out of national reckoning, it becomes difficult to make a comeback. Such shooters could be included in the national camp, which will provide them technical help from coaches besides their training being taken care of.
NRAI said a record 13,522 shooters have qualified to participate in the nationals. Rifle has the most entries – 7013 across classifications. The rifle events will be held at Bhopal’s MP State Shooting Academy ranges from December 15-31. In pistol, there are 5672 entries with competition starting on Wednesday.
A total of 837 shotgun shooters across skeet, trap and double trap events will compete. Anant Jeet Singh Naruka in men’s skeet and Ganemat Sekhon in the women’s skeet will defend their crowns.
“The record participation in the National Championships points to the growing popularity of the sport in the country. Our consistent international success, and particularly the performance of our shooters at the Paris Olympics, where we came back with a record three bronze medals, has contributed to these numbers,” NRAI president Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo said in a statement.
