Paris Olympics 2024: India secure team quotas in archery; Deepika Kumari, Tarundeep Rai set for fourth Games
India's Deepika Kumari competes in the women's recurve individual event at the Archery World Cup Stage 1. PTI
India booked their place in men's and women's teams events in archery for the Paris Olympics later this year. The qualification was confirmed after World Archery updated the team rankings on Monday.
After not making it through the qualifiers, India topped the rankings among the non-qualified nations to seal their quotas.
India will be eligible to compete in all five medal events in Paris -- men's and women's teams, individual and mixed categories.
In the men's team event, India and China made the cut, while in the women's section, Indonesia were the second nation besides India to secure quota.
The men's and women's team events will have 12 sides, while five teams will compete in the mixed event.
For the first time, team quotas are offered to the top-two nations after the three-leg qualifiers.
The first Olympic Qualifier was held at the World Archery Championships in Berlin last year. There, South Korea, Turkey and Japan qualified in men's category while Germany and Mexico secured the spots in women's division.
The second leg was a continental qualifier. Kazakhstan and South Korea took the men's and women's team quotas respectively from Asia, while Colombia and the United States made the cut from Pan-America. From the European leg, Italy (men) and the Netherlands (women) secured quotas.
The final Olympic Qualifier was held in Antalya, Turkey last week. Mexico, Chinese Taipei, Great Britain in men's section; China, Malaysia, Great Britain and Chinese Taipei from the women's section secured quotas.
Tarundeep, Deepika set for fourth appearance
Tarundeep Rai, who made his Olympic debut at 2004 Athens Games, will make his fourth Games appearance.
The same is true for former World No. 1 Deepika Kumari who will also compete in her fourth Olympics, having made her maiden Games appearance at London 2012.
Dhiraj Bommadevara, Ankita Bhakat and Bhajan Kaur will make their Olympic debuts, while for Pravin Jadhav it will be his second successive Games after Tokyo.
India archery squad:
Men: Tarundeep Rai, Dhiraj Bommadevara and Pravin Jadhav.
Women: Deepika Kumari, Bhajan Kaur and Ankita Bhakat.