India shoot to second spot with five-gold haul on day two

Two pairs of shooters were bang on target while the grapplers made a clean sweep of all three titles at stake as India grabbed five gold medals to climb to the second spot in the medals table below Australia in the Commonwealth Games today.

The Indian men's 10m air rifle pair of Olympic gold medallist Abhinav Bindra and world record holder Gagan Narang started the gold rush for the country in the morning which was sustained by women shooters Rahi Sarnobat and Anisa Sayeed who picked up the pairs 25m pistol event for women in style.

Two more silver medals came India's way from the Dr Karni Singh shooting range before greco-roman style grapplers Ravinder Singh (60 kg), Sanjay (74 kg) and Anil Kumar (96kg) made a clean sweep of all three gold medals on offer from the wrestling mat to round off a splendid day for the hosts.

The two silver medals were earned by Deepak Sharma and Omkar Singh, in the men's 50m pistol pairs event, and the woman's duo of world champion Tejaswini Sawant and Lajjakumari Gauswami, who stood second in the pairs 50m rifle 3 position.

The five gold and two silver medals boosted the hosts' overall medal tally to 5-4-2 on the second day of competitions after the weightlifers gave the country two silver and as many bronze medals yesterday.

The three wrestling gold medals pitchforked India to the second place behind Australia after England overtook the home country briefly through their first two golds from the pool won by Liam John Tancock (men's 50m backstroke) and Francesca Jean Halsall (women's 50m butterlfly).

The day commenced in scintillating fashion for India when Bindra and Narang ended the first day's gold medal drought with a Games record of 1193, overtaking their own mark of 1189 set four years ago in Melbourne, to clinch the men's 10m air rifle pairs event.

Their feat was followed by a superb display of calm nerves and dead centre shooting by the women's duo of Rahi Sarnobat and Anisa Sayyed who added the second gold in the women's 25m pistol pairs event with a championship record of 1156 to boot.

Sharma and Omkar ended up second in the men's 50m pairs event (1187) behind Lim Swee Hon and Gai Bin of Singapore.

Later Tejaswani and Lajjakumari finished second in the women's 50m air rifle 3 position, by equalling the 2006 Games mark of 1143 points, Singapore's Aquilah Sudhir and Jasmine Xiang Wei who broke the previous record by six points.

"Many thought I am a dictator, since I had imposed a gag order on the shooters prior to the Games. But whatever I was doing, I was doing for the country. And we have got the reward for that," said a beaming national coach Sunny Thomas after his team members won a medal in each of the four events they took part in during the day.

In the afternoon it was the turn of the grapplers to stamp their authority on the mat with speed and superior technical skills.

Ravinder Singh earned India their first gold medal in wrestling at the Indira Gandhi Sports Complex by outclassing England's Christopher Terence Bosson 7-2 in the 60 kg final.

Sanjay followed his teammate by winning the 74kg gold beating South Africa's Brian Richard Addinall 2-0 in the final.

The icing on the day's performance was provided by Anil Kumar who made it a clean gold medal sweep by overwhelming Australia's Hassene Fkiri 6-0 in the final of the 96kg class.

Indian shuttlers continued to dominate by dumping Barbados 5-0 after having inflicted a similar defeat to Kenya yesterday in the mixed team event.

P Kashyap shone on debut while Saina Nehwal continued her rampaging run. They were well supported by the mixed doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and V Diju as well as the men's and women's doubles combine of Sanave Thomas and Rupesh Kumar and Aparna Balan and Ashwini Ponnappa.

In tennis, men's top seed Somdev Devvarman rallied from 1-4 down against little known Devin Mullings of Bahamas before progressing to the pre-quarterfinals with a straight-set win.

Elsewhere, Indian swimmer Virdhawal Khade was the lone competitor to remain in fray from seven others when he made the semifinals of the 50m buttefly.

Khade, who yesterday helped the men's freestyle sprint quartet to become the first from the country to reach a swimming final in Games history, clocked 24.72s for eighth position.

But six others - Arjun Muralidharan (Men's 50m fly), Jyotsana Pansare, Fariha Zaman (women's 100m backstroke), Talasha Satish Prabhu (women's 100m freestyle), Aaron D'Souza and Rohit Havaldar (men's 200m freestyle) hardly made a splash and exited.

Para sport swimmers brought some smiles as Kiran Tak (00:38.79) and Anjani Patel (00:47.64) progressed to the semifinals in the 50m S9 Freestyle women category.

To add to the on-field drama there was an anonymous call claiming that a bomb has been placed inside the Games Village that triggered panic among the security establishment but was later declared to be a hoax after thorough checks.

Police detained a minor boy who allegedly made the call to the Police Control Room at around 2:30 pm that prompted a thorough security check at the residential complex which hosts about 7,000 athletes.

Dog squads and bomb disposal teams surveyed the 63.5 hectare area, which has 14 blocks, 34 towers and 1,168 air-conditioned apartments, a senior police official said.

A senior police official said a two-hour-long check yielded nothing and the call was declared a hoax.