CHENNAI : It was Dipa Karmakar who kicked off a revolution, coming within a whisker of a medal at the Rio Olympics in 2016. Two years on, the Agartala girl is not the only one carrying the flag for Indian gymnastics.On Saturday, news filtered through that Aruna Budda Reddy had become the first Indian gymnast to win an individual medal at the Melbourne World Cup. Aruna had won the bronze in the women’s vault event with 13.649 average points. The Hyderabad girl finished behind Tjasa Kysslef of Slovenia, who won gold with a score of 13.800, and Emily Whitehead.
The Melbourne World Cup is one of the ten such events on the International Federation of Gymnastics (FIG) calendar and is an invitational tournament with gymnasts from 16 countries participating. Interestingly, neither of the gold and silver medal-winning gymnasts had even qualified for the Rio Olympics and that Aruna’s score (13.649) is below what Dipa had managed at the Games (15.066). Nevertheless, Aruna’s achievement is commendable for no Indian has won a medal at a World Cup series event before.
Aruna had finished sixth in the 2017 Asian Championships and had participated in the Incheon Asian Games and Glasgow Commonwealth Games, though she had failed to qualify for the final rounds of either competitions.“I had called her up and offered her my congratulations,” said Bisweswar Nandi who coaches Dipa. “It is an invitational event and athletes from 16 countries are participating. This is a big achievement for her.”
The Gymnastics Federation of India had sent four Indians to participate in the Melbourne and all four of them had made the final of various events. Pranati Nayak finished sixth in the vault event behind Aruna while Rakesh Patra finished fourth in the men’s Rings event. 2014 Asian Games bronze medallist Ashish Kumar has qualified for the final of the men’s Vault event while Aruna will contest the final of the women’s floor event.
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Results
1. Tjasa Kysslef (SLO) 13.80, 2. Emily Whitehead (AUS) 13.69, 3. Aruna Reddy Budda (IND) 13.64. 4. Georgia Godwin (AUS) 13.58, 5. Jinru Liu (CHN) 13.49, 6. Pranati Nayak (IND) 13.41.