Vijaywada, Dec 27: Five-year-old Dolly Shivani Cherukuri is already being hailed as a wonder-girl in the Indian archery fraternity.
Renowned American movie production company Walt Disney has already made a 21-minute documentary on Shivani.
Shivani started learning archery from her father and coach Satyanarayan Cherukuri, who has set up an archery academy in Vijayawada, after the name of his son Volga who had an abortive death.
Satyanarayan's son Lenin, who won medals in different international tournaments and became the first Indian archer to join junior Indian squad as a qualified coach, also died following a car accident in 2010.
While speaking from Vijayawada Satyanarayan said, “Shivani is the blessing of God. She started firing arrows at the age of 1. I brought bows and arrows from Poland just after she was born and at the age of her 2, Shivani used to practice with that bow and arrows.”
Shivani had created sensation first by throwing 103 arrows within a distance of 10 meters in just 11 minutes. Even she was firing 200 arrows in 24 attempts within 2 hours’ time in a distance of five to seven meters.
Commend Baby Dolly Shivani Cherukuri for firing 103 arrows at a target 10 feet away in just 11 minutes, setting India, Asia Book of Records. pic.twitter.com/qDmsrVai3S
— VicePresidentOfIndia (@VPSecretariat) September 11, 2017
This year she has already won a gold medal in the under-9 archery national championship. Even in her maiden international trip, earlier this year in Asian Youth Cup, Shivani was able to secure 17th position in the recurve section.
More interesting part is that, now this 5-five-year old girl sensation has been training in a distance of 30 meters. According to her father and coach Satyanarayan, his daughter has already been scoring nearly 400 points in the distance of 30 meters.
“Her aim is now to throw 100 arrows in 15 minutes within the distance of 30 meters. She now trains under the head coach of our academy Chandrashekhar and I have observed that she even rectifies mistakes of the senior archers at the academy,” added Satyanarayan.
Now he aims to take Shivani to World Indoor Archery Games and Cadet World Championship. Both the tournaments are scheduled to take place next year.
That is why Shivani is practising even from distance of 50 meters. Satyanarayan hopes Shivani will be able to get into the Indian squad in 2024 Olympics.