Varun Tomar, Esha Singh confirm Olympic quota with 10m air pistol gold at Asian Qualifiers

Varun Tomar and Esha Singh became the latest Indian shooters to qualify for the Paris Olympics that will place later this year by winning 10m air pistol gold in the Asian Qualifiers in Jakarta on Monday. Tomar and Esha won the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol competitions respectively which took the number of Indian shooters qualified for the Paris Games to 15 — equalling India’s largest shooting team at the Olympics that had been achieved in Tokyo back in 2021. The Paris-bound team has room for expansion though with more qualifying events set to take place in the build-up to the Games that take place in July and August. India ended up winning six medals on Monday at the Asian Qualifiers, winning two team golds as well besides Tomar and Esha’s individual victories. The 20-year-old Tomar shot 239.6 in the final to claim the top position, while Arjun Cheema won the silver medal with a score of 237.3. Mongolia’s Davaakhuu Enkhtaivan (217.2) won the bronze medal.

India’s #VarunTomar has won gold
🥇 & India’s 14th @Paris2024 quota place, winning the 10m Air Pistol Men at the #AsianOlympicQualification event in Jakarta. The 20-year old shot 239.6 in the final, leading an Indian 1-2 as Arjun Cheema came second. Brilliant!#IndianShooting pic.twitter.com/uIJ6M3jrIH

— NRAI (@OfficialNRAI) January 8, 2024

Earlier, Tomar (586), Cheema (579) and Ujjawal Malik (575) shot a total of 1740 to win the 10m air pistol team gold, while Iran and Korea claimed the silver and bronze medals respectively. Tomar, a former junior world champion, is the cousin of Tokyo Olympian Saurabh Chaudhary, who won a gold medal in the 2018 Asian Games. “It helped that I had someone like Saurabh to take guidance from as I don’t have anyone in the family who is a shooter,” Tomar, who comes from a farming family, told PTI. The 19-year-old Esha then grabbed the gold in the women’s event with a score of 243.1. The silver went to Pakistan’s Kishmala Talat (236.3), while the bronze was grabbed by Esha’s compatriot Rhythm Sangwan (214.5). The 21-year-old Talat also earned a quota for the Paris Games, becoming the third Pakistani shooter to achieve the feat.

Won the Olympic quota 🇮🇳 2024 Paris with dominance 10Air pistol women Asain championship Jakarta Indonesia2024 @ianuragthakur @TelanganaCMO @timesofindia @Media_SAI @ChairmanIOCL pic.twitter.com/f1Idw5ueqk

— Esha Singh (@singhesha10) January 8, 2024

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Esha, Rhythm and Surbhi Rao also won the team gold medal with a combined score of 1736. Esha is a world championship gold-medallist in the 10m air pistol mixed team and 25m pistol team events. “She can also win a medal, possibly gold, in 25m sports pistol here. But an individual can bag only one quota place for the country. Her bagging the quota in 10m air pistol means she can also compete in 25m sports pistol in Paris,” said Esha’s father Sachin Singh. A total of 16 quota places for the Paris Olympics are available at the continental showpiece in Jakarta. The 10m air pistol events for men and women have four quotas on offer with a maximum of three for the Indian shooters. As many as 385 athletes from 26 countries are in action at the Senayan Shooting Range in Jakarta for 256 medals (84 gold, 84 silver and 88 bronze medals), besides the Paris quotas. Ahead of this tournament, India had won 13 Olympic quota places in shooting across rifle, pistol and shotgun disciplines. With inputs from PTI