New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday called up para-athlete Nishad Kumar to congratulate him for winning a silver medal in the high jump event at the ongoing Tokyo Paralympics.
“PM Shri @narendramodi called @nishad_hj and congratulated him on winning the Silver medal. Nishad thanked PM Modi and also appreciated the continuous encouragement the PM gives to para-athletes,” tweeted SAI Media.
Kumar clinched the silver at the high jump event, creating a new Asian record of 2.06m and marking the second silver for India.
Happy to win silver medal at #Paralympics .I cleared 2.06 m in 2nd attempt. I want to thank SAI, PM Modi, Himachal Pradesh CM&others for their support. I received training under Satyanarayan in Bengaluru for last 2 yrs. Hope more players will come up for Paralympics: Nishad Kumar pic.twitter.com/lHZ7SwFpuu
— ANI (@ANI) August 29, 2021
USA’s Roderick Townsend won gold while Dallas Wise shared the second spot with Nishad. Townsend made the jump of 2.15m while Wise recorded a jump of 2.06 m. Nishad and Wise both finished on the same mark, but Nishad had crossed the 2.02 mark in his first attempt while Wise took two.
India’s Rampal Chahar finished at the fifth spot with a jump of 1.94m.
Earlier in the day, India’s para table tennis player Bhavina won silver as she lost the gold medal match to China’s Zhou Ying 3-0 in the women’s singles – Class 4 in the ongoing Tokyo Paralympics on Sunday.
#Silver Medal for ??#Athletics: Nishad Kumar wins silver medal with a best effort of 2.06m in Men's High Jump T47 event.#Tokyo2020 | #Paralympics | #Praise4Para pic.twitter.com/v5042FmCSX
— Doordarshan Sports (@ddsportschannel) August 29, 2021
With this silver medal, Bhavina is the first table tennis player ever to win a medal at the Paralympics for India and the second female athlete after PCI chief Deepa Malik to achieve this feat. Deepa had won silver at Rio 2016 in women’s shot put.
