India achieves its best ever medal tally at the Paralympic Games, surpassing the 19 in Tokyo three years ago

India achieved its best ever medal haul at the Paralympics by surpassing the number of podium finishes from the last edition thanks to a superlative performance by the country’s track and field athletes here on Tuesday.

A late afternoon avalanche of medals boosted India’s total to 20 (3 gold, 7 silver, 10 bronze) to surpass its previous best haul of 19 medals at the Tokyo Paralympics three years ago.

On a historic day for Indian sports, track and field athletes flexed their muscles for the second consecutive day at the iconic Stade de France, bagging five medals (two silver and three bronze) as the country finished the sixth day of the quadrennial exhibition in 17th place.

India had won five gold, eight silver and six bronze medals at the Tokyo Paralympics.

India’s javelin throwers continued to set the bar high with Ajeet Singh and world record holder Sundar Singh Gurjar claiming silver and bronze with throws of 65.62m and 64.96m respectively in the F46 category.

The F46 category is for field athletes with moderately impaired movement in one or both arms or missing limbs.

High jumpers Sharad Kumar and Tokyo Paralympic gold medallist Mariyappan Thangavelu gave it their all before settling for silver and bronze in the T63 final, with jumps of 1.88m and 1.85m respectively.

The T63 category is meant for high jumpers with moderately impaired mobility in one leg or absence of limbs above the knee. Earlier, world champion sprinter Deepthi Jeevanji secured another bronze for India in the women’s 400m (T20) event with a time of 55.82 seconds to secure a podium spot on her debut at the Games. She finished behind Ukraine’s Yuliia Shuliar (55.16 seconds) and world record holder Aysel Onder (55.23 seconds) of Turkey.

Born to agricultural labourers from Kalleda village in Telangana’s Warangal district, Jeevanji was diagnosed with intellectual disability after one of her teachers spotted her at a school-level athletics competition.

Growing up, she and her parents were teased by the natives in their village because of their disability.

However, the same people have been celebrating her ever since she won gold at last year’s Asian Para Games before breaking the world record at the World Para Championships in May this year to claim another gold medal.

The youngster also received help from national badminton coach Pullela Gopichand after she started training with her formative coach Nagpuri Ramesh.

The T20 category is intended for athletes with intellectual disabilities.

Lekhara campaign ends

However, Indian shooting star Avani Lekhara missed out on her second medal of the Games by finishing fifth in the final of the women’s 50m rifle 3 positions SH1 competition in Chateauroux.

The 22-year-old, paralyzed from the waist down at age 11 due to a car accident, shot a total of 420.6 over the three stages of kneeling, prone and standing in a field of eight world-class women.

However, she has much to celebrate after becoming the first Indian woman to win back-to-back gold medals at the Paralympics after taking first place in the 10m air rifle competition last week.

Germany’s Natascha Hiltrop won gold with a total of 456.5, Slovakia’s Veronika Vadovicova took silver with 456.1 and China’s Zhang shot 446.0 for bronze.

The SH1 class is intended for athletes with lower limb disabilities who compete in rifle shooting events. In this category, shooters can hold their weapon without difficulty and shoot while standing or sitting (in a wheelchair or chair).

Jadhav finishes fifth in shot put

Bhagyashri Jadhav finished fifth in the women’s shot put (F34). Jadhav, who was competing in the Paralympics for the second time, threw 7.28m, but it was not enough to get on the podium.

China’s Lijuan Zou won gold with a season-best of 9.14m, while Poland’s Lucyna Kornobys took silver with an effort of 8.33m.

This 39-year-old Indian woman from Nanded district in Maharashtra is an inspiring story of resilience. She fell into depression after losing the use of her legs due to an accident in 2006.

But she fought to regain her life as a para-athlete with the help of friends and family.

Archer Pooja campaign ends in quarters

World Para Championships silver medallist Pooja Jatyan defeated Turkey’s Yagmur Sengul in straight sets to advance to the quarter-finals of the women’s open recurve competition.

However, the 27-year-old could not maintain the momentum and lost to Tokyo Paralympic Games bronze medallist Wu Chunyan of China at the quarter-final stage.

It was a particularly painful defeat for Chunyan given that Pooja led 4-0 at one point.

Winner of four Paralympic medals, including a team gold at the 2016 Rio Games, the 34-year-old Chinese archer had little to say after a disastrous first set in which she twice shot into the red ring of 7 points to score 23 points.

But perhaps the pressure got the better of Pooja, who squandered her chance by allowing Chunyan to come back in the third set, after which the match took a turn.