Haryana's Neeru Dhanda has created history by winning the gold medal in the Asian Games 2026. She has become the first Indian woman to win gold in the individual event of trap event. Before this, no Indian woman trap or skeet shooter had won an individual medal in the Asiad. Neeru performed brilliantly on Tuesday (September 29) and also created a new Asian record. He scored a total of 28 points in the final, easily breaking the previous Asian record of 24 points.
For India, Randhir Singh had won a historic gold medal in the men's trap individual event in 1978, while Ronjan Sodhi had won the men's double trap individual gold in the 2010 Asian Games.
26-year-old Neeru had earlier also played an important role in India winning the silver medal in the women's trap team event. She became the first Indian woman to win gold in the trap event at the Shotgun World Cup held in Italy in July.
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Neeru had set the qualification record
Neeru jointly topped the list with Ray Basil of Qatar with 118 points and made it to the final of 8 shooters. 118 points was also a Games record in qualification. In the women's trap team event, the Indian team consisting of the trio of Neeru (118), Ashima Ahlawat (106) and Manisha Keer (104) won the silver medal with a total of 328 points. China's team of Liu Shanshan, Sun Yunong and Zhu Jingyu won the gold medal with 346 points. Kuwait team won bronze with 325 points.
In individual qualification, Ashima Ahlawat finished 16th and Manisha Keer finished 23rd and could not make it to the finals. Neeru also showed tremendous performance in the final and by winning gold, India reached 11th position in the medal tally. India is now at number 11 in the tally with 5 gold, 21 silver and 21 bronze.
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Men's trap team disappointed
India's performance in the men's trap team event was disappointing. India finished sixth among 10 teams. Shapath Bhardwaj, however, made it to the individual finals by finishing eighth. 24-year-old Shapath from Meerut finished eighth and last after beating Mohammad Al-Rumaihi in the shoot-off for the last two qualifying spots. The Indian team of Shapath Bhardwaj, Kaynan Chenai and Ahwar Rizvi scored a total of 339 points.
Kuwait won gold with 355 points, Qatar won silver with 349 points and Kazakhstan won bronze medal with 348 points. The Indian men's trap team of Chenai, Zorawar Singh Sandhu and Prithviraj Tondaiman had won the gold medal in the last Asian Games held in China.