Selection Trials For Rifle And Pistol Shooters In March And April

With COVID-19 cases starting to decline across the country, the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) has decided to hold the selection trials for rifle and pistol shooters in March and April this year. The selection trials -- one and two -- for rifle will be held from March 8 to 21 in Bhopal and the pistol trials in Delhi. The selection trials -- three and four -- will be conducted from March 26 to April 7 for rifle in Delhi and pistol in Bhopal. The Indian shooting team for the upcoming ISSF World Cup in Cairo was picked after taking into consideration the qualification scores along with final ranking points of the 64th National Championship as the selection trials could not be held owing to the pandemic.

"Due to COVID-19 conditions in India, the selection trials, which were scheduled to be held in January 2022, were postponed. There was no time left for conducting the trials before selection of teams for ISSF World Cup, Cairo," NRAI had said in a statement after announcing the team.

The season's first World Cup, for pistol and rifle shooters, will see several Tokyo Olympians, including Manu Bhaker and Abhishek Verma, missing from the Indian team.

From the 13 pistol and rifle shooters who represented India at Tokyo, only Saurabh Chaudhary, Divyansh Singh Panwar, Rahi Sarnobat, Aishwarya Pratap Tomar and Sanjeev Rajput were selected for the Cairo meet.

The Cairo World Cup is scheduled to start from February 26.