Sushma Rana shoots down junior national mark

But the most satisfying achievement for Sushma would be the shattering of the juniors’ national mark in the event. Her score of 555 in the qualifier was nine points better than Sonika Manon’s 546. The seniors’ record (570, Kunti Malik), however, remained intact.

Sushma is considered one of the brightest prospects in the game and today’s performance proved that her earlier successes were no flash in the pan. Chief national coach Sunny Thomas was full of praise for her, saying that she will go a long way with her kind of ability. Mr BP Bam, retired IGP and a lending sports psychologist, compared her mental set-up with that of Jaspal and felt that she will only get better with time. In the qualifier, Sushma gave a very consistent performance, scoring 279 in precision and 276 in duelling. She was lying third behind Maharashtra girls Harvinder Kaur Waraich and Sheila Kanungo, both of whom scored 281 points. But nobody could match her skills in the more demanding duelling rounds. The second best including was Balcsh Choudhari’s 270. Sheila and Harvinder faltered badly in the duelling rounds. Sonika also from Delhi, had to be content with the silver in both the women’s and junior’s section. She had scores of 275 in precision and 268 in duelling.

In the final shootout, Delhi’s Balesh edged out Abba Dhillon of Uttar Pradesh for the bronze. Balesh had 539 points after the qualifier, while Abha had 542. Sheila also had a good shootout, which improved her standing to the fourth position after tallying 537 in the qualifiers.

Though there was no cash prize for breaking a junior national record, sponsors of the special prize, Shahi Shipping made an exception for Sushma and handed her a cash prize of Rs 5,000.

The brilliant show by the two youngsters — Sushma and Sonika — also propelled Delhi to the team gold in the event. Along with Balesh Devi’s 539, the trio tallied 1637 points to steer well clear of the Maharashtra team who totalled 1591 points for the silver.

In the men’s 50m free rifle prone, it was Army once again. Like in yesterday’s 10m air rifle, today too they had six of the eight finalists, before national champion TC Palangappa grabbed the gold with a final score of 689.5 points. AP Subbaiah (684.3) and Ashok Kumar Shahi (684.1) completed the sweep for Army.

Even without the assistance of Palangappa’s score, the Army A team, comprising Subbaiah, Shahiand CB Thapa, won the team gold with a total of 1751 points. But that came after a tie-breaker with Border Security Force A, who also tallied the same score.

In the women’s 50m sports rifle prone event, Kuheli Gangulee (585) of the Central Industrial Security Force won the individual gold and also teamed up with bronze medallist Zeny Thakkar (570) and Sumita Ghosh (558) to win the team gold. Maharashtra’s Suma B Dixit took the silver with a score of 571 points. The Infantry Kids dominated the juniors section with a 1-2-3 finish in the form of Raj Kumari (567). Sunita Sanketh (564) and Meena Kumari (563).

RESULTS: Men’s 50m free rifle prone (individual): 1 TC Palangappa (Army) 689.3; 2 AP Subbaiah (Army) 684.3; 3 Ashok Kumar Shahi (Army) 684.1; 4 Iqbal Ahmed (BSF) 684.0; 5 MT Sutar (BSF) 682.1; 6 CB Thapa (Army) 681.3; Men’s 50m free rifle prone (team): 1 Army A 1751 (Ashok Kumar Shahi 585, AP Subbaiah 585, CB Thapa 581); 2 Border Security Force A 1751 (MT Sutar 586, Hanuman Raut 583, Iqbal Ahmed 582); 3 Navy 1725 (F Thomas 575, Bishnu Nag 575, Jagveer Singh 575); Junior men’s 50m free rifle (individual): 1 Jaydeep Karmakar (Ben) 581; 2 Samsher Singh (BSF) 569; 3 Amanvir Singh Wadalia (Del) 566.

Women’s 25m sports pistol (individual): 1 Sushma Rana (Del) 651.6; 2 Sonika Manon (Del) 642.5; 3 Balesh Chaudhari (Del) 634.6; 4 Sheila Kanungo (Mah) 633.7; 5 Harvinder Kaur (Mah) 632.9; 6 Abha Dhilon (UP) 630.8; Women’s 25m sports pistol (team): 1 Delhi 1637 (Sushma Rana 555, Sonika Manon 543, Balkesh Devi 539), 2 Maharashtra 1591 (Sheila Kanungo 537, Harvinder Kaur 534, Nirseen Arsiwala 520); 3 Uttar Pradesh 1563 (Abha Dhillon 542, Anubha Dhillon 511, Aradhana Sharma 510); Junior women’s 25m sports pistol (individual): 1 Sushma Rana (Del) 555; 2 Sonika Manon (Del) 543; 3 Deepali Shokeen (Del) 492; Women’s 50m sports rifle prone (individual): 1 Kuheli Gangulee (CISF) 585; 2 Suma B Dixit (Mah) 571; 3 Zeny Thakkar (CISF) 570, 4 Birmati (Army) and Anjali Vedpathak 569, 6 Rajkumari (INK) 567; Junior Women’s 50m sports rifle prone (team): 1 Central Industrial Security Force 1713 (Kuheli Gangulee 585), Zena Thakar 570, Sumita Ghosh 558); 2 Maharashtra 1700 (Suma B Dixit 571, Anjali R Vedpathak 569, Deepali S Deshpande 560); 3 West Bengal 1644 (Sangeeta Ghatak 557, Surashami Banerjee 553, Mita Mukherjee 534); Junior women’s 50m sports rifle prone (individual): 1 Raj Kumari (INK) 567, 2 Sunita Sanketh (INK) 564; 3 Meena Kumari (INK) 563