Deepika Kumari
Indian archer and Olympian
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Early life
Deepika Kumari was born in Ranchi, Bihar (now Jharkhand) to Shiv Charan Prajapati, an auto-rickshaw driver, and Geeta, a nurse at Ranchi Medical College, and a native of Ratu Chatti village, 15 km from Ranchi. She belongs to a Prajapati family.
As a child, she practised aiming for mangoes with stones. During her early days it was difficult for her parents to financially support Deepika's dream, often compromising on the family budget to buy her new equipment for her training; as a result, Deepika practised archery using homemade bamboo bows and arrows. Deepika's cousin Vidya Kumari, then an archer residing at Tata Archery Academy, helped her develop her talent.
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Career
Deepika made her first breakthrough in 2005 when she entered the Arjun Archery Academy at Kharsawan, an institute set up by Meera Munda, wife of Jharkhand's chief minister Arjun Munda. But her professional archery journey began in the year 2006 when she joined the Tata Archery Academy in Jamshedpur. It was here that she started her training with both the proper equipment as well as a uniform. She also received ₹500 as a stipend. Deepika returned home once in her first three years there, only after having won the Cadet World Championship title in November 2009. Kumari has long been seen as the one to finally get India its first medal in archery.
Personal life
Deepika married archer Atanu Das on 30 June 2020. Their daughter, Vedika, was born in December 2022.
Achievements
Deepika became the second Indian to win the title after Palton Hansda won the junior compound competition at the 2006 Archery World Cup in Mérida, Mexico.
She won the 11th Youth World Archery Championship held in Ogden, Utah, United States in 2009, at the age of fifteen. She also won a gold medal in the same competition in the women's team recurve event, alongside Dola Banerjee and Bombayala Devi.
At the Delhi Commonwealth games 2010, Deepika won two gold medals, one in the individual event and the other in the women's team recurve event. For this, she was honoured with the Outstanding Performance at CWG (Female) Award at the 2010 Sahara Sports Awards ceremony.
Later at the Asian Games of 2010, held in Guangzhou, China, Deepika missed out on a medal after she lost to Kwon Un Sil of North Korea in the bronze-medal play-off of the women's individual archery event. But as a part of the Indian archery recurve team, along with Rimil Buriuly and Dola Banerjee, Deepika edged out Chinese Taipei 218–217 in the bronze play-off to ensure a podium finish at the Aoti Archery Range.
In May 2012, Deepika Kumari won her first World Cup individual stage recurve gold medal at Antalya, Turkey. She beat Korea's Lee Sung-Jin by six set points to four in the final. Later in 2012, she would go on to become world no. 1 in Women's Recurve Archery. In London Olympics 2012, Deepika Kumari lost against Amy Oliver of Great Britain in the opening round, attributing a relatively poor performance to fever and high winds.
On 22 July 2013, she won the gold medal in Archery World Cup stage 3 held at Medellin, Colombia where India finished fourth. On 22 September 2013, Deepika lost 4–6 to Yun Ok-Hee of South Korea & settled for silver medal in 2013 FITA Archery World Cup. This was her 3rd Silver medal in as many appearances in the World Cup Final.
In 2014, Deepika was featured by Forbes (India) as one of their '30 under 30'. However, she failed to make the Indian team for 2014 after finishing outside the top 4 at the national qualifications.
In 2015, Deepika's first medal came at the second stage of the World Cup, where she won a bronze in the individual event. At the World Championships in Copenhagen, she won a team silver along with Laxmirani Majhi and Rimil Buriuly, after narrowly losing out on a gold in a match against Russia which they conceded 4–5 in a shoot-off. In the latter half of this year, she won the silver medal in the World Cup final. In November 2015, she won a bronze medal in the Asian Championships with Jayanta Talukdar in the Recurve Mixed Team event.
In April 2016, at the first stage of the World Cup in Shanghai, Deepika equaled the Ki Bo-bae's world record of (686/720) in the women's recurve event.
Deepika Kumari was the part of the team that qualified for 2016 Rio Olympics. The Indian women's recursive team, consisting of Deepika Kumari, Bombayla Devi Laishram and Laxmirani Majhi, finished 7th in the ranking round. The team won their match against Colombia in the round of 16 before losing the quarterfinal match against Russia.
In the women's Individual archery, Deepika Kumari produced a stellar performance in the round of 64 against Kristine Esebua of Georgia. Deepika won this round with a score of 6–4. In the next round, Deepika had a much-easier outing against Guendalina Sartori of Italy. Deepika started badly and lost the first round but won the next three to ease through 6–2 in the end. However, in the round of 16, Deepika went down to Taipei's Tan Ya-ting with a score of 0 against 6.
In November 2019, Deepika Kumari secured an Olympic quota at the Continental Qualification Tournament being held on the sidelines of the 21st Asian Archery Championships in Bangkok. Deepika Kumari India won 3 gold medals in the Archery's World Cup Stage 3 tournament in Paris 2021. She thus recorded the 13th triple gold and became the 11th archer to achieve the feat – in the 15-year history of the Hyundai Archery World Cup.
In popular culture
A biographical documentary called Ladies First, released in 2017, was made by Uraaz Bahl and his wife Shaana Levy-Bahl. The movie won at the London Independent Film Festival and was screened at the Mallorca Film Festival in October 2017. Ladies First has also been submitted for the Short Documentary category at the Academy Awards.
This documentary was also screened for Maneka Gandhi, the Union Cabinet Minister for Women and Child Development, with an aim to increase awareness about women in sports in India.