World Deaf Shooting Championship: Mahit Sandhu wins 50m rifle prone gold, Abhinav Deshwal settles for silver

Mahit Sandhu (centre) Pic: X

India's Mahit Sandhu clinched the gold medal in the women's 50m rifle prone event while Abhinav Deshwal secured silver in the men's 25m pistol, on the fifth day of the second World Deaf Shooting Championship at Hanover, Germany.

With those two medals, India increased their tally to 15, including four gold, seven silver and four bronze.

This was Sandhu's second gold and overall third medal at the Deaf Shooting Worlds. Earlier, she had won gold in the mixed 10m air rifle along with Dhanush Srikanth and silver in the 10m air rifle individual event.

She shot 247.4 in the finals, 2.2 more than Hungary's Mira Biatovszki. The Indian shooter qualified for the finals after topping qualification with 617.8. The other Indian shooter in the fray, Natasha Joshi, finished seventh in the finals.

Deshwal was edged out by Ukraine's Oleksandr Kolodii in the final series by a solitary point. Both shooters were tied on 37 after the ninth series. In the 10th, Oleksandr shot a perfect five while Deshwal could only manage four to settle for silver.

The other Indian shooters Shubham Vashist and Chetan Sapkal finished fifth and seventh respectively. Deshwal had also bagged silver in 10m pistol individual, mixed and team events.

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Meanwhile, on Tuesday, Pranjali Dhumal secured a bronze medal in the Women's 25m Pistol event. Dhumal's performance was particularly noteworthy as she qualified for the finals with an impressive score of 571, setting both a deaf world record and a championship record.

During the World Deaf Shooting Championship finals, Dhumal demonstrated remarkable precision and composure. She clinched the bronze medal by successfully hitting three out of five shots in the crucial eighth series. T

his performance allowed her to narrowly surpass Croatia's Lana Skeledzija by a single point. Dhumal finished the final round with a total score of 29, placing her behind the Ukrainian shooters Sofiia Olenych and Halyna Mosina, who secured the gold and silver medals, respectively.

(With agency inputs)