Harvinder leads State to gold

Earlier, on Thursday night, Anjali Vedpathak (485 aggregate, 386 in qualifier) equalled the national record (386, Soma Dutta) in the air rifle event to emerge a comfortable winner. Maharashtra considered a powerhouse in this section, bagged the team gold and bronze.

However, Anjali won’t be eligible for the special prize of Rs 10,000 as her score of 386 in qualifier less than the best performance by an Indian — Deepali Deshpande’s 390 in last Masters — which is not considered a national record as it was not scored in the National Championship.

Harvinder, who is a part of the Indian team for the forthcoming Commonwealth Shooting in Kuala Lumpur, was a runaway leader at the end of the 40-shot qualifying round with a total of 374. Second-placed Balesh had 360, while Maharashtra’s Sheila Kanungo was third with 359.

However, Balesh made a gallant effort in the final shootout, in which she scored 100.1 points from her 10 shots. Harvinder scored 92, but such was her initial lead that the gold was no problem. Sheila (453.7) won the bronze.

Harvinder and Sheila combined with Nirseen Arsiwala to win the team gold for Maharashtra with a total of 1085. Delhi (Balesh, Sushma Rana and Sonika Manon) took the silver at 1068 points.

In the air rifle event, Anjali scored 99 points in the shootout which enabled her win the gold with an 8.5-point lead over Zeny Thakkar (476.5) of CISF. Deepali Deshpande took the bronze with an aggressive of 476.1.

In the team event, Anjali, Deepali and Suma Dixit gave Maharashtra A the gold, while CISF (Kuheli Gangulee, Sumita Ghosh, Leena Shirodkar) took the silver. Maharashtra B (Anuja Tere, Charushila Choudhary, Shital Satam) won the bronze.

Rana wins another gold: In all this gold rush by Maharashtra women, Jaspal Rana managed piece of yello metal. This time in the standard pistol event with a score which will leave him disappointed. Rana, who has scored more than the world record of 584 (he sccored 585 in Coimbatore Nationals), and who equalled the juniors’ world record of 569 during his gold medal performance in Milano World Championship in 1994, scored 570 today. His state-mate, Vivek Singh stood second with 565, while BSF’s Naresh Kumar took bronze with 562.

Rana scored 98 and 97 with one perfect card 50 in the 150-second series, 98 and 94 in the 20-second series and 88 and 95 in the 10-second series.

Army whitewash: There seem to be no challenge to the Armymen in the rifle events.

Today in the free rifle three position, they took the first six positions with Charan Singh winning the gold with a final tally of 1219 points. TC Palangappa was second with 1213.3 points, while Mahavir Singh added a bronze to his free rifle gold when he beat AP Subbaiah to the bronze after both scored 1123 points in the qualifiers. In the final shootout, Mahavir scored 85.9 points, while Subbaiah tallied 84.1.

Results

Men’s 25m standard pistol: Individual: 1 Jaspal Rana (Del) 570, 2 Vivek Singh (Del) 565, 3 Naresh Kumar (BSF) 562, 4 Ashok Pandit (Mah) 561, 5 Surendra Kumar (Army) 559, 6 TK Sikdar (Navy) 558.

Team: 1 Delhi 1679 (Jaspal Rana 570, Vivek Singh 565, Samaresh Jung 544), 2 Navy 1656 (TK Sikdar 558, Mukesh Kumar 550, Satendra Kumar 548), 3 Border Security Force A 1650 (Naresh Kumar 562, Manjunath Patgar 547, Morad Khan 541).

Juniors: 1 Rajesh Kumar (Army) 545 (128 in shootout), 2 Vijay Kumar (Army) 545 (121 in tie-breaker), 3 Kamal Sain (UP) 528.

Men’s 50m free rifle three position: Individual: 1 Charan Singh (Army) 1219, 2 TC Palangappa (Army) 1213.3, 3 Mahavir Singh (Army) 1208.9, 4 AP Subbaiah (Army) 1207.1, 5 Ashok Kumar Shahi (Army) 1202.8, 6 Raj Kumar (Army) 1197.2.

Team: 1 Army A 3363 (TC Palangappa 1125, AP Subbaiah 1123, Ashok Kumar Shahi 1115), 2 Army B 3361 (Charan Singh 1129, Mahavir Singh 1123, Raj Kumar 1109), 3 Border Security Force A 3295 (Nepal Singh 1106, Iqbal Ahmed 1105, Raj Kumar 1084).

Women’s 10m air pistol: Individual: Anjali Vedpathak (Mah) 485, Zeny Thakkar (CISF) 476.5, 3 Deepali Deshpande (Mah) 476.1, 4 Anuja Tere (Mah) 473.6, 5 Suma Dixit (Mah) 473.6, 6 Sunita Ghosh (CISF) 472.

Team: Maharashtra A 1135 (Anjali Vedpathak 386, Deepali Deshpande 376, Suma Dixit 373), 2 Central Industries Security Force 1113 (Kuheli Gangulee 374, Leena Shirodkar 365), 3 Maharashtra B 1045 (Anuja Tere 376, Charushila Chaudhary 345, Shital Satam 324).

Juniors: 1 Sumita Ghosh (CISF) 374, 2 Raj Kumari (Infantry Kids) 365, 3 Usha Sharma (INK) 362.

Women’s 10m air pistol: Individual: Harvinder Kaur Waraich (Mah) 466, 2 Balesh Chaudhary (Del) 460, 3 Sheila Kanungo (Mah) 453.7, Seema Gaur (Del) 452.5, 5 Anubha Dhillon (UP) 452.3, 6 Sushma Rana (Del) 449.4.

Team: 1 Maharashtra A 1085 (Harvinder Kaur Waraich 374, Sheila Kanungo 359, Nisreen Arsiwala 352), 2 Delhi 1068 (Balesh Chaudhary 360, Sushma Rana 356, Sonika Manon 352), 3 Uttar Pradesh 1064 (Anubha Dhillon 359, Abha Dhillon 354, Sonal Ramender 351).

Juniors: Anubha Dhillon (UP) 359, 2 Charu Pragya (Mah) 357, 3 Sushma Rana (Del) 356.

Women’s rifle three position: Juniors: Sumita Ghosh (CISF) 530, 2 Raj Kumari (INK) 528 (92 in final shots), 3 Sunita Sanketh (INK) 528 (88 in final 10 shots)