India’s shooting campaign at the Asian Games 2026 ended with 15 medals after Anish Bhanwala finished seventh in the men’s 25m rapid fire pistol final at the Aichi Prefectural General Shooting Gallery on Thursday.
Anish was tied on 11 points with other shooters but was eliminated on countback, with his lower qualification ranking placing him seventh.
Indian shooters finished their campaign with three gold, eight silver and four bronze medals.
Anish entered the final despite finishing ninth in qualification with a score of 576-17x. Three South Korean shooters finished among the top eight, but with a maximum of two shooters from each National Olympic Committee (NOC) allowed in the final, Anish secured the eighth and final qualifying spot.
Indian pistol shooters had a relatively modest campaign, winning two of the country’s 15 shooting medals. India secured silver in the women’s 10m air pistol and gold in the mixed team 10m air pistol.
Elsewhere, India advanced to the men’s quadrant semifinals in sepaktakraw and assured itself of a medal after completing an unbeaten group-stage campaign with a 2-1 comeback win over Myanmar.
India lost the opening game 10-15 but bounced back to win the next two 15-13 and 15-7 and top Group A. The team had earlier defeated the Lao People’s Democratic Republic and Vietnam.
In canoe slalom, Shikha Chauhan finished seventh in the women’s kayak single final, clocking 193.31 among the eight finalists.
In judo, Inunganbi Takhellambam lost to North Korea’s Mun Song-hui by ippon in the women’s 70kg quarterfinal. She advanced directly to the bronze-medal bout after her scheduled repechage opponent, China’s Jing Tang, was disqualified.
(IANS Inputs)
