India’s Aakash Bhardwaj and Palak bagged silver medals in the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol event on the opening day of the World University Shooting Championships on Saturday, while the hosts bagged three medals. Arshdeep Kaur added to the score by taking the bronze medal after Palak at the Karni Singh Shooting Range.

While Aakash shot 579 in the qualifying round and took second place in the final, two other Indians, Samrat Rana and Amit Sharma, also advanced to the eight-shot final with 577 and 576 points respectively. Pavel Schejbal from the Czech Republic came first in the rankings with an impressive 586 points.

In the final, Aakash gave Pavel a tough fight and narrowly missed out on the gold medal. While Pavel scored 239.8 points, Aakash scored 238.8 points. Amit and Samrat stood sixth and seventh respectively. Filip Wagner won the bronze medal.

In the women’s 10m air pistol event, three Indian shooters – Sainyam (576), Arshdeep (574) and Palak (573) – qualified for the final in third, fourth and fifth positions respectively. Liu Heng-Yiu from Chinese Taipei led the heats with 578 points.

In the competitive final, Liu narrowly won the gold medal with 239.4 points against Palak’s 239.1. Arshdeep won the bronze medal with 219 points, while Sainyam took sixth place.

220 shooters from 23 countries are participating in the championship and it is hosted by Manav Rachna International Research and Research Institute.