City lad Tanish a shooting star

Manav Mander

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, August 18 

He started playing the sport as a hobby and it soon became his passion. Tanish Galhotra, Class XII commerce student from KVM Public School, is a national-level air-rifle shooting champion.

It was in 2013 when Tanish first entered the shooting range following in his elder brother’s footsteps who was a state-level champion then.

“Our school has a shooting range and my elder brother was also in the sport, so I joined it just for fun. Then came the tournaments and I was thrilled to clinch a gold medal. This was the moment when I started taking the sport seriously. My achievement motivated me and the sport became my passion,” he said.

After this, there was no looking back for Tanish who, just like his role model Abhinav Bindra, has developed a shooting range at his home. “Shooting has now become a stress buster for me. Whenever I want to rejuvenate myself, I go to my shooting range and I wing myself. It has become a healing therapy for me,” he says.

He said maintaining a balance studies and sports was difficult sometimes, but not impossible. “I practice for three to four hours regularly in the morning at Govind National College under coach Gurjeet Singh. I understand the value of study and try to divide my time judiciously,” he said.

Tanish has his fingers crossed and is hopeful of getting selected in the national team.

His achievements

2016-17

• CBSE National— silver medal
• CBSE Cluster — silver medal
• Gold in District School Games
• Gold in State School Games (team)
• Silver in Open Punjab State 

2015-16

• Silver in open district above-21 category and gold in the youth category 
• Bronze in open state /16th Punjab School 

inter-school

2014-15

• Silver in 15th Punjab Inter-School State Games
• Silver in Open State Games in Jalandhar 

2013

• Gold medal in Open District Championship 

at Narangwal

• Silver in 14th Punjab State Inter-School State tourney at Narangwal