Bengal shooter Mehuli Ghosh, who now trains at Gagan Narang’s Gun for Glory Shooting Academy in Hyderabad, has been picked for the ISSF World Championship which will be held in Cairo from October 12-25. With the quota places for 2024 Paris Olympics Games up for grabs in Cairo, Mehuli will have a fair chance to win one in her pet event 10m air rifle.

The 21-year-old will partner Elavenil Valarivan and Meghna Sajjanar in the team event and in the mixed team event she will be with Arjun Babuta. In July, the shooter from Baidyabati in Hooghly grabbed the headlines by winning gold in the 10-metre air rifle mixed team event with Shahu Tushar Mane in Changwon, South Korea. She then teamed up with Ramita and Elavenil Valarivan to win a silver in the women’s team event.

“Cairo is the first step in realising my Paris Olympic Games dream”, she had told The Telegraph in July. The National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) announced a 48-member Indian rifle and pistol squad for the tournament on Friday. The biggest news though is pistol shooter and 2012 Olympic Games silver medal winner Vijay Kumar making the cut.

Four years after his last international tournament, Kumar had returned to the national squad in April this year. Kumar, who finished second in 25m rapid fire pistol in the 2012 Olympics, had taken a break due to a chronic shoulder injury. Posted at the Himachal Pradesh police headquarters in Shimla as a deputy superintendent of police, Kumar had made a comeback to competitive shooting last year after a gap of five years, “starting from zero”.

A five-time Commonwealth gold medallist, Kumar had left the Army to join Himachal Pradesh Police in 2017. The current squad is full of rookies with Kumar and Anjum Moudgil bringing in the experience.