Know Your Heros : Avani Lekhara - The fighter who just keeps shooting

08/13/2018

Sportscafe

What would one classify as a good story? Is it the tale of a champion who has achieved success after being continuously pitted against challenges or is it the story of a hero whose life was a bed of roses?

While nothing to be taken away from any of the latter, it is the former who, more often than not, inspire the world because they rise from obscurity, mediocrity, and adversity through sheer determination. The story of the differently-abled, proving their mettle in the field of sports, or anything substantial for that matter, is such an endearing tale of bravery and deserves more than just a trifling mention.

Talk to Avani Lekhara and you will realize how cruel life can be. Hers is a full cycle of being pampered as a kid, then seeing the worst phases of life and eventually, conquering all the odds to shot a junior world record 244.4 in the women’s 10m air rifle. It is a story that just keeps on giving.

She was just another kid - fun-loving, and indeed pampered for being the youngest in the family. However, she didn’t know that sleeping in the car would show her the worst dream of her life. She was in a car with her mother and brother with her father driving it from Dholpur to Jaipur in 2012. However, a terrifying accident saw her mother’s spinal cord being severely injured, but her father and brother somehow escaped anything serious. Avani, who is a with the GoSports foundation, however, saw the nightmare come to life when she woke up in the hospital as doctor informed that she wouldn’t be able to walk by herself. She was completely paralyzed from the waist down and had to stay in the hospital for almost four months. While it was painful for her physically, emotionally it took a toll as well.

“It was very hard, my mother was also injured so she was also not there to take care of me, it was only my father and grandparents so it missed my mom at that time. When you are in an ICU and you don't see your mother...” Avani told SportsCafe.

It is only the hard times that push champions to the limit and the strong will to stand up again in her life meant universe conspired the positivity for her and she came across a shooting range and the biography of Abhinav Bindra - the reticent legend who won the first individual Gold for India at the grandest stage of all.

“After my accident happened in 2012, in 2014 we shifted to our new home and it was very close to the shooting range.

After my ninth, one day I just casually went to the shooting range. They also had archery. I tried both, but Archery was little harder for me, as you have to get a perfect bow and in shooting I shot very good shots in the starting.

Like I was more interested in shooting. It was a like a half an hour thing and then I came back. I read Abhinav Bindra sir’s story. So, it was like a starting, when he was a kid like me, he started shooting and then started the lot and came on the top. After that it inspired me and I thought I can also try it. I started going to the range after that.”

“At the start, I was not interested in it because it is very hard for a wheelchair person to learn the techniques of a normal person as they stand and we have to do all the things on a wheelchair only. So, putting the hands were all very new for my first coach also. He taught me the things which are for an able bodied person. It was very hard to start but when I got my first national medal, I started to think that we can do something even bound to a wheelchair. If I try to do this, then I will be one of the few people who can inspire somebody. Most of them don't take Shooting because it's a little expensive than other sports. But, after I started shooting I met some other para shooters. So, it was after my first nationals that I was inspired towards shooting.”

And what a blessing it turned out to be! She made a new record immediately in only the second nationals of her career. In December 2016, she won three gold medals at the nationals and in her first World Cup in Dubai, three months later, she shot a junior world record of 244.4 in the women’s 10m air rifle standing SH1 event (R2) to secure India's second silver of the competition. It was a memory that still gives her goosebumps.

“It was a very new experience for me over there. I was also the smallest among all of my competitors. Even, when they announced in the finals, they announced like there are three generations playing in that match. In that I won a silver medal, which was my first International medal. After that I started thinking that I have to do well and win a gold medal and I have to participate in Olympics and win a medal in that. I started taking shooting more seriously after that, I started going for practice. Then I thought why should participate only in para category, I should participate in normal as well. Because at the end of the day people think that it's para.”

Listening to her makes anyone be sure that she is not under any sort of pressure for the upcoming Asian Games and it is just a matter of time that she would reach the pinnacle of the sport.

“I'm not so much pressuring myself. I'm just practicing really hard and in the matches, I'm not stressing myself and just going to go with the flow.”

Certainly, I won’t agree with the last line. She is not going with the flow rather creating one. A child who is inspiring an entire generation. No matter what she does in the Asian Games, she has already carved the niche and blazed a trail that would inspire thousands to see the light at the end of tunnel.

AAA

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