* Deepika Kumari in World Archery Final *

[Rapp-Chikk]

[img]http://www.tehelka.com/channels/TheHub/2010/Aug/28/images/Medal.jpg[/img]

[url=http://idiva.com/news-work-life/diva-in-focus-deepika-k-in-world-archery-final/1720]http://idiva.com/news-work-life/diva-in-focus-deepika-k-in-world-archery-final/1720[/url]

[url=http://www.tehelka.com/story_main46.asp?filename=hub280810Imbetterthen.asp]http://www.tehelka.com/story_main46.asp?filename=hub280810Imbetterthen.asp[/url]

SIVNARAYAN MAHATO is an auto-rickshaw driver in Ratu, a tehsil in Ranchi, Jharkhand. Three years ago, he saw the first signs that were to change his world for ever. Today, he still drives his auto but his 16-year-old daughter Deepika is on her way to fulfilling the good omens. Deepika is the latest hope for an elusive Olympic medal in a sport whose greatest exponents ever — Arjuna and Dronacharya — have lent their names to India’s top sporting awards.

Three years ago, Deepika Kumari picked up a bow for the first time and today, astonishingly, she is a national champion in archery. She competes in recurve, a tough form of archery where the bow is without a lens and adjustable string length. It is a sport that relies entirely on the sharpness of your eyes, the power of your shoulders and the technique of the release of the arrow. It is the kind of contest that the great Indian epics are littered with. Deepika’s epic win was the women’s gold medal at the 11th Youth World Archery Championships in the US last year. She beat Russian Sayana Tsyrempilova 115-109 in the finals in a long, hard tournament.

In school, Deepika had done a bit of athletics and a cousin suggested she try archery. Even when weighing the bow and the handmade bamboo arrows in her hands for the first time, she knew she was meant to be an archer. Around this time, scouts from the Seraikela- Kharsawan Archery Academy (run by Meera Munda, wife of Jharkhand’s former Chief Minister Arjun Munda) spotted her. She was admitted into the academy. A year in training and Deepika knew she had what it takes to be very, very good. Later, she moved to the Tata Steel Sports Academy in Jamshedpur. Within months she was on the flight to Antalya, Turkey, with the Indian team. “I met the best players in the world in Turkey. I learnt a lot just by talking to some of them,” she recalls.
DEEPIKA KUMARI AGE 16 ARCHERY 2009 GOLD Cadet recurve section for women at the 11th Youth World Archery Championships 2009 GOLD Senior National Champion 2009 GOLD Sub-junior National Champion

Modern archery may not require you to hit an apple on top of your son’s head or the eye of elusive birds but it still needs fiendish concentration

On a Saturday afternoon when most teenaged girls outside the Sports Authority of India (SAI) complex in Salt Lake, Kolkata are contemplating leisure, Deepika is sweating through a gruelling three-hour practice. Modern archery may not require you to hit an apple perched on your son’s head or the eye of elusive birds, but it still requires fiendish concentration. Deepika exudes confidence. She looks at you with wide, piercing eyes and hits you right on the money, just as she keeps hitting 10s — the bull’s eye — relentlessly from 70 metres. Day after day. Week after week.

Deepika says that her mother, Geeta Devi, a government hospital nurse, was not too pleased with her taking up archery. “I was the first even in the extended family to play any sport. My mother is conservative and was against my decision. But now they — my parents and my younger sister — are genuinely proud of me,” says Deepika.

[Ara Gundu]

congratulations congratulations congratulations  ATB

[ramu]

*=: *=: *=:  sHa_clap4 sHa_clap4

[Indian1211]

[quote author=Ara Gundu link=topic=95775.msg1020541#msg1020541 date=1283575589]
congratulations congratulations congratulations  ATB
[/quote]
*7*^ nuv enti epudu vachav epativaraku em feekav .... sCo_hmmthink

[Rapp-Chikk]

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“I am happy I do not have to ask my parents for money,” says the small-town girl whose small indulgences include momos and pasta. She gets a monthly stipend of `6,000 from the Tata Archery Academy, which is enough for now.

But the future, Deepika hopes, will bring better prospects. “The financial status of my family hasn’t changed. After my world championship title, I received `1 lakh from the Jharkhand Archery Association and `50,000 from the Tata Academy. That’s it,” she says.[/color][/b]