Pak shooters to compete in Beijing for Olympic quotas

KARACHI: After missing the world cup in India, Pakistani shooters will now try to win Olympic quotas at ISSF World Cup Rifle/Pistol in Beijing.

Ghulam Mustafa Bashir and Khalil Ahmed will participate in Rapid Fire pistol event in this world cup that is scheduled from April 21-29. It is to be noted that both the shooters were denied visas by India for ISSF World Cup Rifle/Pistol being held in New Delhi from February 20–28.

“Both the shooters were very disappointed,” said Secretary National Rifle Association of Pakistan (NRAP) Razi Ahmed while talking to ‘The News’. “They had been training very hard hoping to achieve good results and win quota places in this World Cup in India,” said Razi. He said Bashir was working in Qatar on a very lucrative salary but left his job and returned to Pakistan to train with the hope of winning a Quota Place for Tokyo Olympics.

They had performed reasonably well in the World Championship in South Korea last year. Bashir scored 583 out of 600 in that championship, missing the finals just by one point. Khalil scored 579 out of 600. This score helped them achieve world rankings of 11th and 25th, respectively. Both the shooters are on IOC Olympic Scholarship Programme.

It is pertinent to mention here that after denial of visas to these shooters NRAP demanded from International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) that Olympic qualifying status of Rapid Fire Pistol event in ISSF World Cup in New Delhi should be revoked and the allocated Quota places be carried forward to the next ISSF World Cup scheduled to be held in China in April.

The IOC suspended the Olympic Qualifying status of these events in the world cup. Razi said it was the wholehearted effort of POA president Arif Hasan, who was in contact with the President of International Olympic Committee (IOC), to get Indian shooting world cup lose its Olympic qualification status.