Sheetal Devi and Rakesh Kumar End India's Archery Drought, Win Bronze Medal at Paralympics 2024

After enduring the tough loss by the narrowest of the margins in the semi final, Indian archers Sheetal Devi and Rakesh Kumar won the Bronze medal for India in the Mixed Team Compound event at Paralympics 2024.

he Indian duo of Sheetal Devi and Rakesh Kumar staged a remarkable comeback after the heartbreak in the semifinals to claim the bronze medal with a 156-155 win over Italy's Eleonora Sarti and Matteo Bonacina in mixed team compound archery competition at Paralympics here on Monday. It is only the second time that India has won a medal in Paralympics in archery. Harvinder Singh bagged an individual bronze at the Tokyo edition of the Games three years ago.

Sheetal also became the first Indian woman to win an archery medal at the quadrennial showpiece as coach Kuldeep Vedhwan rejoiced at the stands. India won after the 17-year-old Sheetal's shot in the final end was upgraded from 9 to 10 following a revision. Something similar had happened in the semifinal too, against Iran earlier in the evening, but the Indians were at the receiving end on that occasion.

The Indians shot 10, 9, 10 10 in the final end to reach 155. The Italian pair responded with 9, 9, 10, 10 to draw level at 155-155. It was at that point that the judge decided to take a closer look at Sheetal's shot and concluded that it was a 10, leading to India's victory. Before that, with just four arrows left, the Indians were trailing by a point with Sarti displaying awesome form even as her partner Bonacina struggled a bit. But the Indian pair held on to emerge winners in the end.

It was a great comeback by the Indians after they went down in shoot-off following a dramatic semifinal clash against Iran's Fatemeh Hemmati and Hadi Nori. Both Rakesh and Sheetal failed to win medal in the individual event at the Games this year. Earlier in the evening, the Indians looked on course to make the final but a fine Iranian rally and revision of score by a judge came in their way.

The match went into shoot-off after the scores were tied 152-152. It seemed like the Indians had won it after the Iranians shot a nine with their fourth arrow in the final end. However, much to the disappointment of the Indian duo, the target judge revised a shot of nine from Iran (their second arrow in the final end) to 10 after evaluation, taking the contest into shoot-off.

Both the teams had perfect scores in shoot-off but Fatemeh's arrow hit the centre. Her shot was much closer to the bulls eye, paving the way for Iran's passage to the final. In their last eight match, the Indian pair combined well to progress to the semifinals with a 154-143 win over Indonesia's Teodora Audi Ayudia Ferellyin and Ken Swagumilang.

The top seeds in the mixed compound open event, Sheetal and Rakesh, displayed fine form en route to the semifinal. The Iranian duo prevailed over Brazil's Jane Karla Gogel and Reinaldo Vagner Charao Ferreira 153-151 in their quarterfinal clash. The Indians sealed the win with a perfect 40 in the fourth and final end. In open class (compound bows, for archers with little strength in the arms), archers shoot from a sitting position at a distance of 50m at an 80cm five-ring target made up of the 10-6 point bands. Sheetal, 17, was born in 2007 with phocomelia, a rare congenital disorder leading to underdeveloped limbs. The condition resulted in her arms not fully forming.

The 39-year-old Rakesh suffered a spinal cord injury and after recovering in 2009 he realised he would be wheelchair-bound for life, which plunged him into depression and even forced him to contemplate taking his own life.

(With inputs from PTI)