Avani Lekhara unable to compete in Para Sport WC as coach & escort's visa not released

Tokyo Paralympics gold medallist Avani Lekhara took to her official social media account to express her disappointment over her coach and her escort not being granted a visa for the upcoming World Shooting Para Sport World Cup in Chateauroux, France. The 20-year-old won a gold medal in the 10m air rifle standing and a bronze medal in 50m rifle 3 positions.

With Lekhara's coach and escort not having received a visa, she will not be able to travel to France for the World Shooting Para Sport World Cup. On hearing her disappointment, the Sports Authority of India (SAI)'s social media handle responded to her Tweet.

Lekhara expresses disappointment over her team not receiving visas

Taking to her official Twitter handle on June 4, Avani Lekhara requested External Affairs Minister of India S. Jaishankar, Minister of Sports & Youth Affairs Anurag Thakur, among others, to provide her with any assistance they can to get visas for her escort Ms Shweta Jewaria and her coach Mr Rakesh Manpat. She highlighted that it was an important match for her on the seventh of June.

Notably, according to PTI, Lekhara is not the only athlete who will be unable to compete at the Paralympics Shooting World Cup in France, as six members of the Indian contingent were denied visas despite the intervention of the Indian government. In response to Lekhara's Tweet, the SAI said, "It is unfortunate that all the visas of the Indian Para Shooting Contingent going to France have not been approved. All efforts were made by MYAS and MEA to secure all visas but unfortunately this time the efforts did not materialise." 

Speaking of the situation in a conversation with PTI, chief national coach and chairman of Indian para shooting Jai Prakash Nautiyal said, "Singharaj, Rahul Jhakhar and Deepinder Singh (all para pistol shooters) and two coaches Subhas Rana (national coach) and Vivek Saini (assistant coach) did not get their visas."

He went on to add, "The French embassy didn't mention any reason, simply said there is a huge surge for visas. We applied for our visas on April 23 and were sure of getting all cleared. The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) also intervened and were helping us but despite that visas of six members were rejected."

"We are now going with a 22-member contingent, which includes 14 shooters. We were quite confident of getting visas of all members cleared since Paris will be the host for the next Paralympics and there are 18 2024 Paralympics quota places on offer in the tournament," Nautiyal concluded.

The World Shooting Para Sport World Cup event, which takes place from June 4 to 13, is of huge significance to the Paralympics athletes as the Paris Paralympics quota places are on offer there.