Bhopal: Madhya Pradesh's para shooter Rubina Francis has bagged a gold medal at the World Shooting para sport World Cup. Rubina, daughter of a motor mechanic, has won gold for the nation at women's 10m air pistol SH1, finishing far ahead of the rest of the field.
Francis defeated Bigaisha Makhayeva of Kazakhstan in the final round to finish with a score of 238.1 to the Kazakh's 230.4. Hailing from Jabalpur, Francis is the only player from Madhya Pradesh among 11 players in the Indian team, who has been selected for the World Shooting Para Sports World Cup.
Notably, Rubina Francis has bagged a gold medal in the World Shooting Para Sports World Cup held at Bangkok in 2017 too. She had made a world record in the junior category of the 10-metre Air Pistol Women Team Event there. She has bagged a total 15 gold and 2 silver medals for the state in national championships.
Rubina has been receiving the training of shooting under the guidance of Chief Coach of the Shooting Academy Jaspal Rana, assistant Coach Jaivardhan Singh Chouhan and Oshin Tawani since 2017. She has so far represented team India in eight international para-shooting championships. In 2019, Rubina won a bronze medal for the country in the Para Shooting World Cup held in Croatia.
Francis' first coach from her hometown, Nishant, had said, when Rubina had started training, there wasn't enough support available. GFG had stepped up and supported her all the way. Private funding, for that matter, did help her a lot, he said. Nevertheless, as she started becoming more of an international player and started making a name for herself, government support came, he added, saying that he was extremely proud of his student.
