The shooting World Cup in India will feature rifle, pistol, and shotgun shooters.
New Delhi will host one of the five International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Cups next year in March.
New Delhi’s Dr Karni Singh Shooting Range was supposed to be the venue for an ISSF World Cup in March earlier this year as well but it had to be postponed and subsequently cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The decision to let India host the World Cup this year again was taken at the ISSF executive committee meeting, where National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) president and ISSF vice-president Raninder Singh was present.
According to the ISSF calendar, the remaining four World Cups next year will be held in South Korea (Changwon), Azerbaijan (Baku), Egypt (Cairo) and Italy (Lonato).
“It was decided that the final tournament of the year 2021, with the participation of 12 best athletes in each individual Olympic discipline, would be held in the capital of Azerbaijan – Baku in the second half of October 2021,” the ISSF website said.
Apart from the senior ISSF World Cups, India’s junior shooters will also get a chance to return to the international circuit with the World Championships scheduled to be held in Peru’s Las Palmas.
The junior ISSF World Cups will be hosted in Suhl (Germany) and Almaty (Kazakhstan).
After dry firing, home target practising and online shooting competitions had kept Indian shooters busy for most of the lockdown, the NRAI had planned to resume a national camp for the Olympic core group.
However, with the pandemic situation not improving, the camp was called off.
Indian shooters sealed as many as 16 Olympic quotas before the qualification tournaments were suspended for the year.