The Indian campaign at the 2025 ISSF Rifle/Pistol World Championships started with a bang as Ravinder Singh clinched the gold medal in the non-Olympic event of men’s 50m pistol in Cairo, Egypt on Saturday.
The 29-year-old Ravinder was dominant right from the start in the competition and was crowned the world champion with an impressive score of 569.
The silver medallist Kim Cheongyong, meanwhile, was 13 points shy of the Indian at 556, underscoring Ravinder’s dominance.
The gold medal win marked a second consecutive World Championships podium for Ravinder, having won the bronze medal in men’s 50m pistol at the 2023 edition in Baku with a score of 556.
Ravinder’s splendid outing also propelled India to a silver medal in men’s 50m pistol team event with a combined score of 1646 – two points short of gold medallists South Korea.
Kamaljeet (540) and Yogesh Kumar (537) were the other two, who formed the three-member Indian team in the event.
In women’s 50m pistol, Priyanka Patel was the best finishing Indian at the sixth position with a score of 533.
Later in the day, Elavenial Valarivan bagged the bronze medal in women’s 10m air rifle. She shot a total of 232 in the final to finish third on the podium.
With a score of 633.4 to finish fifth in the qualification round, Elavenil was the only Indian woman to qualify for the final.
Meghana Sajjanar (631.2) and Shreya Agarwal (628.7) finished 17th and 33rd respectively.
The trio, however, combined to win India a women’s 10m air rifle team bronze with a score of 1893.3.
Elsewhere, India finished medalless in men’s 10m air rifle.
Arjun Babuta, the only Indian to qualify for the final, finished seventh with a score of 145. He was just 0.2 points short of Hungary’s Zalan Pekler for the sixth spot when he was eliminated.
Earlier, Babuta had reached the final with a qualification score of 632.5. He along with former world champion Rudrankksh Patil (631.4) and Vishal Singh (627.1) finished fourth in men’s 10m air rifle team event.
