The International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) has confirmed New Delhi as the host of the Asian Olympic Qualifying event. The competition will be held at the Dr Karni Singh shooting range in Tughlakabad from January 25 to February 3. National Rifle Association of India President Raninder Singh has received a letter from the executive committee of the International Shooting Federation (ISSF), confirming the selection of NRAI as the organisers of the event.ISSF executive committee selected National Rifle Association of India’s (NRAI) bid as they was the only to propose to host all three events – rifle, pistol and shotgun – at one venue, and only the official announcement was awaited which ISSF made on Tuesday.
The meet will have 35 Rio Olympics quota at stake and will be the last chance for the shooters to earn a ticket to the 2016 Games. India, which already has eight Rio Olympic quota places sealed, would be looking to make the most of ‘home-advantage’ to grab as many quota places as possible Over 1000 shooters from 36 countries are expected to take part in the meet.Earlier, the tickets were on offer at the Asian Shooting Champion ships in Kuwait early this month but they lost the Olympice status after they
denied a visa to Israel’s Yair Davidovich,a technical delegate nominated by the ISSF for the event.
Delhi will be hosting the event at a no cost basis since the shooters already had spent the money for the Kuwait Meet. The likes of Heena sindhu,Manavjit Singh Sindhu ,Ronjon Sodhi are amongst the stars participating in the competition.All eyes will be on Heena sindhu who has recently found her form.The Ludhiana born girl won gold infront of her home crowd and went to carry her good form to Kuwait.
Indian pistol coach Maninder Singh is excited and said playing in a familiar condition will be a big boost.