With India’s winning run at the World Cup and athletes like Niranjan Mukundan securing 5 golds at a para-swimming tournament, it has been a good month for Indian sports so far.
Now, while anyone even remotely concerned with cricket knows what’s going on in the World Cup, people like Niranjan need to be talked about more.
Niranjan – a 24-year-old swimmer from Bengaluru – is suffering from a condition called Spina Bifilda. This has led to problems with the growth of his spinal cord.
He was also born with clubfoot (foot growing twisted) and had to undergo several injuries to get it back to normal.
Considering he has faced this since birth, it is only commendable that he didn’t lose hope and decided to become a swimmer. A great one at that.
His 5 gold medals are proof that persistence can get you anything you want.
Meanwhile, Indian archers also made us proud at the recently concluded World Championships in Netherlands with their highest ever medal haul, 3 (1 silver and 2 bronze).
The men’s team (Atanu Das, Tarundeep Rai and Pravin Jadhav) also bagged a place in the upcoming Summer Olympics, while Jyothi Surekha Vennam won India’s first individual medal in compound archery.
Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju met the entire squad and felicitate the players, recently.
Speaking of great performances, Indian shooters got India a top spot in the Munich ISSF World Cup a little while back. With 5 gold medals, this was India’s best tally at the tournament till date.
The winners with their respective events are as follows:
Apurvi Chandela (10m Air Rifle Women)