India’s Aakash Bhardwaj and Palak clinched silver in the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol respectively as the hosts bagged three medals on the opening day of the World University Shooting Championships here on Saturday. Arshdeep Kaur added to the tally with a bronze behind Palak in the Karni Singh shooting range.

Aakash shot 579 in the qualification round, securing second place heading into the final, while two other Indians, Samrat Rana and Amit Sharma, also advanced to the eight-shot final with scores of 577 and 576, respectively. Pavel Schejbal of the Czech Republic topped the leaderboard with an impressive score of 586.

In the final, Aakash posed a tough challenge to Pavel, narrowly missing out on gold by a single point. Pavel scored 239.8, while Aakash scored 238.8. Amit and Samrat finished in sixth and seventh place, respectively. Filip Wagner took the bronze.

In the women’s 10m air pistol event, three Indian shooters – Sainyam (576), Arshdeep (574) and Palak (573) – qualified for the final in third, fourth and fifth position respectively. Liu Heng-Yiu of Chinese Taipei led the standings with a score of 578.

The final was very close, with Liu winning gold by a fraction of a point, scoring 239.4 to Palak’s 239.1. Arshdeep bagged bronze with a score of 219, while Sainyam finished in sixth place.

The championship has the participation of 220 shooters from 23 countries and is organized by the Manav Rachna International Research and Studies Institute.