India's Top Rifle Shooters To Compete In RR Lakshya Cup On March 16-17

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The premier invitational shooting competition, which is conducted by Lakshya Shooting Club, the brainchild of Olympian, Arjuna Awardee, World Record Holder and 'Dronacharya' Suma Shirur, has only grown from strength to strength year after year.

Suma Shirur, who was conferred the prestigious Dronacharya Award in December 2022 and is also the Founder-President of Lakshya Shooting Club that was established in 2006, said: "Lakshya Cup is a great opportunity for shooters to test their skills in a hard-fought genderneutral competition. I'm sure the shooters will embrace the challenge of top-notch shooting and enjoy the camaraderie over the two days (March 16-17) including the Finals day on March 17."

The RR Lakshya Cup, powered by RR Global, is usually held in December but the 14th RR Lakshya Cup 2023 could not be held in the last month of 2023 as it was clashing with the hectic NRAI calendar, what with 2024 being the year of the Summer Olympics. The weekend of March 16-17, 2024 is a relatively free period devoid of major national and international competitions.

The Lakshya Cup has been the first of its kind in promoting gender equality. As Founder President of the Club, Suma first mooted the idea that men and women should shoot equal number of shots in a match. And, since the first edition of the Lakshya Cup in 2008, this competition has been following that. The move was vindicated when in December 2017, the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) adopted the equal shots rule for both men and women.

Odisha-born Shriyanka Sadangi, winner of the 13th RR Lakshya Cup 2022, won the Quota Place for India for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games in 50m Rifle 3 Positions last year. Among the star-studded shooters who were previously seen in action and won the RR Lakshya Cup include:

1. Paris 2024 Quota place winner and reigning World Champion Rudrankksh Patil of
Maharashtra, was the winner of the 2021 RR Lakshya Cup edition.

2. Tokyo 2020 Olympian and Finals World Record Holder Divyansh Singh Panwar of
Rajasthan had won the RR Lakshya Cup in 2018.

3. Tokyo 2020 Olympian and multiple World Cup winner, Aishwary Pratap Tomar of
Madhya Pradesh, was the 2019 winner of RR Lakshya Cup

4. Deepak Kumar of Air Force (2017) and Meghana Sajjanar of Karnataka (2016) are
among the past winners too.

Lakshya Shooting Club has the distinction of being a Khelo India-accredited academy since October 2018. The RR Lakshya Cup, over the years, has also provided an ideal preparatory ground for the shooters going for international competitions. The respective 2018 & 2017 winners, Divyansh Singh Panwar & Deepak Kumar, had won the Tokyo Olympic Quota places as did the runner up in 2017, Anjum Moudgil.

The 9th RR Lakshya Cup 2017 Junior gold medal winner, Shahu Mane, went on to win silver at the Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires in 2018. Besides, the 13th Lakshya Cup 2022 chief guest was none other than Tokyo Paralympics gold medallist Avani Lekhara, herself a trainee of Suma Shirur at the academy.

The chief guest of the 14th RR Lakshya Cup 2023 is Dr. Pierre Beauchamp, High
Performance Director of the Indian shooting team and Peak Performance Director, Paris Olympics 2024.