Suma Shirur, a three-time CWG medallist who is now part of the national coaching group, termed the CWG a major first taste of the higher level for shooters.
One of the most endearing images for Indian sport from the 2018 Commonwealth Games (CWG) was of a teenaged Anish Bhanwala, flanked by a much older Englishman and Aussie, grinning ear to ear on the podium with the mascot tucked firmly in his left hand and the gold medal in his right. All of 15 then, the Haryana shooter had won the men’s 25m rapid fire pistol event with a Games record to hold the distinction of being India’s youngest ever CWG champion.
New Delhi, India - Feb. 27, 2019: Indian shooters Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary won the gold in the final of mixed 10m Air Pistol at ISSF World Cup, at Karni Singh Shooting Ranges, in New Delhi, India, on Wednesday, February 27, 2019. (Photo by Burhaan Kinu/ Hindustan Times) (Burhaan Kinu/HT PHOTO)
Indian shooters over the years have not only provided such early glimpses of potential at the CWG, but also infused the strongest push into the country’s medal rush at the multi-nation event. And as the Indian contingent gears up for the 2022 CWG on the back of its 66-medal count and third-place finish from four years ago in Gold Coast, it will have to do without its enforcer-in-chief in Birmingham.
Organisers of the Birmingham CWG dropped shooting from its programme, the first time since the 1970 edition in Edinburgh that the sport will not feature at the Games. Ironically, after reasoning that the closest Olympic-standard shooting range was some 250km away from Birmingham, the Commonwealth Games Federation decided to hold a separate Commonwealth Archery and Shooting Championships thousands of miles away in India before cancelling that too owing to the pandemic.
And as things stand, shooting — as also wrestling and archery — does not find place in the initial sports programme list for the 2026 CWG as well.
Shooting’s exclusion caused considerable backlash in India, understandably so going by just statistics. The sport has accumulated 135 out of the total 503 medals — 63 of the 181 gold — won by India at CWG. It tops the list of sport-wise medals and is part of the three-sport club to hand India 100 or more medals (weightlifting and wrestling are the other two). The CWG, of course, do not see participation from the traditional shooting powerhouses like USA and China, who have 116 and 67 medals respectively at the Olympics (India have four).
At the CWG, though, India has been the best shooting nation in four of the previous five editions, with the exception of the 2014 Glasgow Games where Australia sat atop. Its percentage contribution to the overall medal volume has been consistently high. In 2018, shooting won 24% of India’s medals (16 out of 66), 27% (17 out of 64) in 2014, 30% (30 out of 101) in the 2010 edition at home, a whopping 54% (27 out of 50) in 2006 and 35% (24 out of 69) four years prior.
But as much as shooting has been the key to India’s Commonwealth command, the CWG too has been a significantly early pit stop for shooters.
Suma Shirur, a three-time CWG medallist who is now part of the national coaching group, termed the CWG a major first taste of the higher level for shooters.
“In our times, shooting was nowhere, so for us the first time we broke into the international scene was the CWG. CWG has fewer countries than, say, the Asian Games which also has giants like China and Korea, but the countries that are there are competitive in shooting. So, breaking into that league and winning was always a big first step, and that added immense confidence going to the next level — the Asian Games and the World Championships. It’s sad that such a stage is no longer available for the shooters,” Shirur, who won the 10m air rifle silver in Manchester two decades ago apart from a couple of pairs medals in 2002 and 2010, said.
The CWG, in many ways, was a springboard to the Asian Games and the Olympics in the four-year Olympic cycle for shooters. That also stands altered in the curtailed current three-year period from the delayed Tokyo Games in 2021 to the 2024 Paris Olympics, with the Asian Games postponed to next year.
“The CWG was good preparation for the Olympics, wherein you get the flavour of what the Games are like,” Gagan Narang, the 2012 London Olympics bronze medallist who has eight CWG gold medals to his name, said. “And in your four-year Olympic cycle, it’s good to start warming up from the CWG and then go on to the Asian Games and eventually the Olympics. In a way it’s good for our shooters that the Asian Games will now be held next year.”
Narang, who was India’s flag-bearer at the closing ceremony of the 2010 home CWG, could sense the “discrimination” against shooting from the next edition itself in Glasgow, where medal events in the sport were trimmed to 19 from 44 in New Delhi.
“A lot of the team events were dropped, and yet we managed a good haul. Now that it’s been dropped altogether, it’s really unfortunate. The CWG had a lot of significance for Indian shooters, and for India too because shooting has always dominated the medals table,” Narang said.
That won’t be the case in Birmingham. The heavy-lifting will have to be done elsewhere, perhaps drip by drip from the other sports, where India doesn’t already have a stranglehold, to fill the well emptied by shooting’s absence.
“Shooting not being there is 100% going to be a factor,” said Viren Rasquinha, the former India hockey captain and CEO of Olympic Gold Quest. “Take away the shooting medals from last time and we’re down to 50. I believe that 50 from other sports could cumulatively rise to 60 this time, which would still be a fairly big jump.”
Indian shooting has been going through a bit of a lull anyway, picking up its pieces in the rebuilding phase post the Tokyo Games blip. In the Shooting World Cup in Korea this month, Indian shooters won 15 medals to top the charts. A lot from the current batch of young shooters haven’t had the experience and feel of a CWG. The missing-it murmurs in the set-up therefore are only natural.
“The new generation is well aware of what we’re missing. All of them definitely talk about it,” Shirur, part of the rifle coaching setup, said. “For us, we will always remember the CWG. For these shooters, there are so many competitions lined up in any case. No time to stand and stare.”
As the Indian contingent straps and plays in Birmingham, the shooting squad will huddle for a training camp in New Delhi. “Unfortunately, we can do nothing but watch the show go on from the sidelines,” Shirur said.
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