Jamshedpur: The team silver bagged by 21-year-old Jharkhand archer Madhumita Kumari at the Asian Games in Jakarta, Indonesia, will further boost the sport which has grown by leaps and bounds in the state for over a decade.

Sanjeeva Singh, who introduced compound archery in the country in 2004, believes state archers, who do not perform well in the globally more acceptable recurve division, have the option of switching over to the compound form which is comparatively easy as the bow is lighter.

"Initially, everyone discouraged me from compound archery saying it had no future. There were no sponsors and funds. However, Jharkhand Archery Association (JAA) and Tata Steel pitched in and helped us buy equipment. We trained the archers and some of them even went to win medals for the first time in the 2005 Asia Cup in Bangkok," Singh, a Dronacharya awardee and senior vice-president of Tata Housing, said.

The good show at the Asia Cup prompted former chief minister Arjun Munda to come forward and set up a cradle at Kharsawan. The state government, the Archery Association of India and the sports ministry also started supporting the sport.

"Government support started yielding results as Seraikela archer Paltan Hansda became the junior world champion in 2007 (Mexico) and Jhanu Hansda, who switched over to compound from recurve, won the gold medal at the Asian Championship held in Myanmar in the same year. At one time, Indian women's team comprised only Jharkhand archers - Jhanu Hansda, Niva Kerketta, Bansara Lin Dhar and Bhegyabati Chanu - who started dominating at the Asian level," Singh, an archery observer for the sports ministry and a former secretary of JAA, said.

On how did he introduced compound archery, Singh, who also helped the state government set up the archery excellence centre in Ranchi said, "I saw compound archery for the first time when I visited New York as coach of the Indian recurve team for the 2004 World Championship. Soon I realised it would be very good for Indian archers who were not strongly built and did not have good height. I bought the first compound bow from the US and started practicing and mastering the technique."

On Madhumita, Singh said the Silli-based Birsa Munda archery cradle cadet was the underdog in the Indian team and was least expected to win a medal.

"But she had the intensity and the desire to overcome all odds. She kept on learning from all the coaches and was the only one in the Indian team who improved her performance over the selection trials. She excelled because her dedication and commitment was unquestionable," Singh, the former chief of Tata Steel sports wing, recalled.