With 20 Gold medals in their kitty so far, India remain well on course to better its past record as Commonwealth Games reach the halfway mark. With hopes of 32 Gold medals tally up for grab in today’s events of Archery, shooting, Wrestling, weightlifting and tennis, India are right on track for overhauling its best-ever medal tally of 30 in Manchester Games Eight years ago. Athletics, swimming and table tennis are other events of the day. AIR correspondent reports that after five days of intense competitions inside different stadia, the action of Delhi Games 2010, will also be seen on the roads from today with long-distance runners, walkers and cyclists competing in their events. Twenty-kilometer race walk in both men and women categories is now under progress. On Friday, India culled an impressive tally of 14 medals, including six Gold and a rare athletics bronze in track events taking the overall tally to 20 gold, 16 Silver and 12 Bronze medals. Standing firmly on the second position, India are just two Gold behind their second-best tally of 22 gold in the last Games in Melbourne. England with 18 gold under their belt and Canada with 14 Yellow metal are at the third and fourth spot while Australia has taken a clear lead with 47 Gold in their kitty. For India, shooter Gagan Narang plucked his third Gold by winning the 50m 3-position pairs event with partner Imran Hasan Khan on Friday. Pistol experts Vijay Kumar and Omkar Singh became the champions in 25m rapid fire and 10m air pistol events. Not to be outdone by the men, the country's women competitors chipped in with their share of the yellow metal with the recurve team of Dola Banerjee, Bombayala Devi and Deepika Kumari opened the gold medal account at the archery range.Later, women grapplers Alka Tomar (59kg freestyle) and Anita (67 kg freestyle) fought their way to Gold medals in grand style. While Alka outclassed Athens Olympic silver and Beijing Games bronze medallist Tonya Verbeek of Canada, Anita beat Megan Budyens of Canada winning the first two rounds on points. Long distance runner Kavita Raut also made history by becoming the first athlete to bag a medal, bronze, in women's track events in the Games history. It was also the country's tenth medal in track and field events since 1958 when “Flying Sikh” Milkha Singh bagged India's lone gold medal at the Cardiff Games.To add lustre to the Gold, the country also bagged five silver and three bronze medals. Seasoned trap shooting pair Manavjit Singh Sandhu and Mansher Singh got a Silver in pairs trap event, pistol expert Vijay Kumar stood second in the 25m Rapid Fire event, and grappler Babita Kumari won another silver in the women's 51kg category. India also won Silver in the team event of women's table tennis and badminton and Ashish Kumar (artistic gymastics). Bronze standards were attained by rifle shooter Gurpreet Singh in the 25m individual competition, men's archery trio of Rahul Banerjee, Jayanta Talukdar and Tarundeep Rai in the recurve competition and woman athlete Kavita Raut.
News On AIR | October 9, 2010 7:59 AM
Eyeing more Golds, India set to break record