Paris, Sept 7: High jumper Praveen Kumar upgraded his Tokyo silver to a gold with a record-smashing performance, helping India nose ahead of the likes of Korea and Switzerland in the overall standings as the country’s para-athletes continued to defy projections in their best ever Paralympic performance here.
Later in the evening, Hokato Hotozhe Sema claimed the bronze medal with a personal best effort of 14.65m in the men’s shot put F57 final to end the day for India on a positive note.
The other Indian participant in the shot put final, Soman Rana ended fifth with a best throw of 14.07m.
Employed with the Indian Army and currently based in Pune, the Dimapur-born Sema started with 13.88m before touching 14.00m. He followed that with 14.40m, 14.65m, 14.15m and 13.80m.
Sema, 40, became involved in the sport after he lost his left leg in a landmine blast during a military operation in 2002.
The F57 category is for field athletes who compete while seated and have limb deficiencies or other impairments that don’t fit into other classes.
Earlier, the 21-year-old Praveen from Noida, who was born with a short leg, jumped to a new Asian record of 2.08m in the T64 category, which also featured athletes of T44 classification.
He clinched the top honours ahead of USA’s Derek Loccident (2.06m) and Uzbekistan’s Temurbek Giyazov (2.03m).
T64 is for athletes with movement moderately affected in one lower leg or the absence of one or both legs below the knee, while T44, to which Praveen belongs, is for athletes with movement affected at a low or moderate degree in one lower leg.
The country’s medal haul swelled to 27, including six gold, nine silver and 12 bronze medals. The performance surpasses all pre-Games projections and with one more day of competitions left, it is expected to get better.
Opting to start from 1.89m, Praveen aced seven jumps in his first attempt to put himself in pole position. The bar was then raised to 2.10m, with Praveen and Loccident fighting for the top spot but both failed to clear the mark.
Praveen, who was also the 2023 world championship bronze-medallist, recorded not just an Asian record but his personal best performance too.
His impairment, which is congenital, affects the bones that connect his hip to his left leg.
In his formative years, Praveen has confessed to grappling with feelings of inadequacy.
He started playing sports to deal with his insecurities and found a passion for volleyball. But his life changed when he took part in a high jump event at an able-bodied athletics competition.
He is the third high jumper after Sharad Kumar and Mariyappan Thangavelu to secure a medal in Paris.
Sharad and Thangavelu won silver and bronze in the men’s high jump T63 event on September 3. (PTI)
