NRAI Chief Keen On Senior Team Having Local Trainers

MUMBAI: President of the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI), Raninder Singh, has major aspirations for the sport in the country. One among the many ambitions he and his team harbours is that by the time the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games are over, the NRAI should be able to adequately train Indians to become coaches of the national shooting team.
“I am not averse to foreigners coming and training Indian shooters.But I want a situation where Indians can become good coaches and shepherd our athletes. They are self-reliant,” Raninder said on the sidelines of the signing of a “high performance partnership” with the JSW Group. The duo has gotten into an agreement to identify, train and develop shooting talent for the 2020 and 2024 Olympics.
Citing the example of India’s junior shooting squad, Raninder said: “Currently our ranked No. 1 in the world. They are so far ahead that actually there is no competition for them. And mind you all the juniors are being trained by Indian coaches. If Indian coaches can help the junior shooters to achieve such high standards at the international level, I don’t see any problem in them coaching the senior national team too. Also, foreign coaches have the issue of coming to terms with Indian culture. If Indians are at the helm, this culture thing will not be an issue.”
Meanwhile, the alliance will also provide the NRAI access to JSW’s own high performance resources and experts for training. The partnership opens doors for Indian shooters to be trained at the world-class Inspire Institute of Sport (IIS), a premier training facility established by the corporate group in Karnataka.
On his part JSW’s Parth Jindal, said: “We endeavour to achieve systemic growth and sustainable results. We realize that the most effective way to achieve this in developing sports talent is to enable and support systems. The NRAI has been one of the most successful federations over the past few years. They have managed to introspect and make changes to the status quo in order to improve athlete performances.”