Abhinav Bindra’s Olympic gold is of no help to the country’s other shooters, who are still an ignored lot, feels world record holder marksman Ronjan Sodhi.
“The Olympic gold will do wonders for Abhinav personally but what good it has done to shooting in India as such?” asked Sodhi. “Ordinary shooters still have to beg and borrow for the guns and cartridges,” he told PTI as he practiced here for the National Shooting Championships at the Jagatpura.
The double-trap marksman, who missed the wild-card for the Beijing Olympic just by a whisker, also felt that Abhinav’s historic feat of winning the first individual Olympic gold would also be forgotten soon.
“It has happened before too. People forget too soon,” said Sodhi, who equaled the world record twice in the ISSF World Cup at Belgrade, Serbia, in June. Criticising the laxity of officials in the country, Sodhi said a lot more was required to be done for the sport of shooting in terms of better utilisation of facilities.
“You have a world class range at Jagatpura but it’s unlocked for us only now. I feel that all ranges should have guns and pellets for upcoming shooters. This would broaden the base of shooting in country. The facilities are not being utilised properly,” he said.
The 29-year-old shooter, however, lauded NRAI for whatever it was doing for the sport. “It was hard to import the gun and pellets but now once you achieve a certain score you can easily import an air gun and pellets,” he said.
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