Asian Para Games: India win gold in shot put, shooting as tally surges to record 82 medals

India created history in the ongoing 2023 Asian Para Games in Hangzhou on Thursday, clinching the country’s best ever medal tally as it surged to 82 medals. At the Jakarta Para Asian Games in 2018, India had recorded its then best medal tally of 72, and in five years, India have set a new medal record in the competition. Among the 82 medals, 18 of them are gold, 23 silver and 41 bronze medals. India are currently placed eighth in the medals tally. Sachin Sarjerao Khilari won the first gold of the day in men’s F46 shot put with a Games record throw of 16.03m while Rohit Kumar took the bronze with 14.56m. Para shooter Sidhartha Babu then bagged another gold in R6 mixed 50m rifle prone SH1 event as he shot an Asian Para Games score of 247.7. The compound mixed team of Sheetal Devi and Rakesh Kumar won a gold after defeating their Chinese counterparts Lin Yueshan and Ai Xinliang 151-149 in the final. India also won a bronze medal in archery men’s doubles W1 event with the pair of Adil Mohamed Nazir Ansari and Naveen Dalal defeating the Kazakh pair of Nurshat Toleukassym and Sagdat Duisembayev 125-120. Simran and Bhagyashri Madhavrao Jadhav won a silver each in women’s T12 100m and women’s F34 shot put respectively. Simran clocked 26.12 seconds while Jadhav cleared 7.54m. Narayan Thakur won a bronze in men’s T35 100m with a time of 14.37 seconds. Shreyansh Trivedi also took a bronze in men’s T37 100m with a time of 12.24 seconds. In para badminton, Sukant Indukant Kadam (men’s singles SL4), Sivan Nithya Sumathy (women’s singles SH6), Manisha Ramadass (women’s singles SU5), Mandeep Kaur/Manisha Ramadass (women’s doubles SL3-SU5), Krishna Nagar/Sivarajan Solaimalai (men’s doubles SH6) and Pramod Bhagat/Sukant Indukant Kadam (men’s doubles SL3-SL4) won a bronze medal each after losing their respective semifinal matches. In chess, Bhaveshkumar Rathi Himanshi picked up a bronze in women’s individual standard VI-B1 event. With inputs from PTI