Do not be deceived by the external appearance of the soft-spoken shooter Tilottama Sen, because beneath that apparent veneer of softness lies a girl of steel.
All of 14 years and the youngest member of the India squad, the gritty girl bagged a bronze in women’s 10m air rifle at the ISSF World Cup in Cairo last month with a score of 262.0 in the ranking match. This, incidentally, was her first senior World Cup.
“I wasn’t even aware that I was up against four Olympians when I participated,” Tilottama told The Telegraph after her return to her base in Bangalore. “But on the day of the competition, I had promised myself that I will come back with a medal.”
“And no,” she continued, “I don’t allow the pressures of fighting on the international stage to affect me. When I contest, it is me versus myself. I blank out others.”
Tilottama was initially interested in volleyball and karate. “Then, during the lockdown, everything stopped and I started spending more and more time before the TV set. “That is when dad (Sujit Sen) suggested I try out shooting. There was a range close to our house and dad took me there and introduced me to the sport.”
That is how it all started and in a matter of three years, Tilottama’s progress has been phenomenal. She started off with a silver and three bronze medals in the junior category at the 2021 nationals.
Last year, she won an individual bronze and the team gold at the Junior World Championships in Cairo. In November last year, Tilottama clinched a brace of gold — in individual and team events — in the Asian Airgun Championship in Daegu.
A Class IX student of Bangalore’s Bluebell Public School, how does she balance work and practice?
“I go to school two days a week but make all efforts to catch up on my studies. The teachers have been very supportive.” As has been the seniors of the squad. “Any problem with my technical issues, I turned to them,” said the ward of the Reliance Foundation which has provided her with a physiotherapist and a nutritionist and is looking into her mental well-being as well.
According to Mailthili Bhuptani, sport and exercise psychologist, Sir HN Reliance Foundation Hospital: “We did assessments like an athlete’s coping skills on Tilottama and we created an intervention plan for her. The results have been positive.”
Does Tilottama visit Calcutta, where her roots lie?
“Oh yes, I often do. I have a lot of relatives there, including my two sets of grandparents,” she said. A die-hard fan of Abhinav Bindra — as also of Gagan Narang and Italian Olympian Niccolò Campriani — an Olympic medal is definitely a long-term goal. But for now, her focus is all on the World Cup in Bhopal which begins on March 20.
