Indian Shooters have been a disaster, says top marksman Joydeep Karmakar

Indian shooting team’s poor performance in the Tokyo Olympics has become the topic of discussion. When the 15-member contingent left for Tokyo, it was anticipated that the team would surely bring some medals. But with the early exit of the shooting team, some of the experts were confused as to what had gone wrong with the 15-member contingent.

Joydeep Karmakar, who competed in 50m rifle and is among the well known indian shooters, termed India’s showing as a “disaster” and called for “introspection”.

The Arjuna awardee Karmakar took to his twitter handle and shared his disappointment after the below par performance. “Now I would call it a disaster! This (10m air pistol mixed team event) was a calculated and biggest hope from #Shooting #TeamIndia and let’s not blame luck… rather everything gained after this can come with the little help of luck!”, tweeted Joydeep who has competed in more than 25 world cups.

But this was not the only tweet Joydeep posted to show his frustration. Karmakar tackled the fact that the shooters were young, “In a level playing field no one is a kid. Kids? Of course, they are kids with their age, I love & will be loving them all the way as my kids too, & I’m close to them more than 99% ppl here. But as an athlete on the playing field I don’t ‘undermine’ them as ‘kids’. In a level playing field no ones a kid. We will protect them… at the same time it’s our responsibility to make them strong and agile in a tough situation. Somewhere we need to realize, It’s not about guns, balls or racquet, it’s your mind which is the strongest equipment that can win medals at Olympics. We need introspection!” further tweeted Arjuna awardee Karmakar.

Another Top pistol shooter Heena Sidhu, whose husband Ronak Pandit is the coach of the Indian pistol team in Tokyo also took to twitter to share his frustration and tweeted, “Disappointing show at the 10m range today. Bad bad day for Indian Shooting Saurabh did well, he needed Manu to perform at her end. Disappointing”, tweets Ronak Pandit.

As per IANS, Deep Bhatia , who is Former vice-president of the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) and the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games sports manager, pointed to the fact that shooters were not mentally prepared.

“Shooters tried to give their best, but it seems they were not mentally trained and there was a failure on part of the coaches as well as managers (to guide them).”

He also emphasised on the “vested interests” in shooting sports in the country, which he said was a big reason for the dismal show at the Olympics.

“There is a lot of vested interest in shooting, especially conflict of interest, when it comes to managers and coaches,” Bhatia further quotes.

There was a lot of hope for medals from the shooting team but the disappointing performance has raised many eyebrows back home and certainly it will be addressed with all the undivided attention.