Setting her own benchmark

It's hard being Manu Bhaker. Call her a champion trapped in the body of a teenager, or a teenager who has never got to lead a normal life like many others of her age, this girl is under scrutiny — perpetually.

At the ISSF Junior World Championship in Lima, Peru, Manu is being Manu, shooting medals with aplomb. Her tally of five medals thus far is indeed a stupendous record in one edition of the championship, which no other Indian has achieved before. This is indeed a far cry from the images one saw of Manu at the Tokyo Olympics in July where she failed to win a medal.

Forget winning a medal, in Tokyo, Manu was haunted in many ways — she being a pale shadow of the confident self that one has witnessed in the past. The problem with Manu is none other than Manu herself.

It's a bit like being Virat Kohli, where you are expected to hammer a hundred each time you go out to bat — be it a Test, ODI or even T20 international. 19-year-old Manu faces the same kind of scrutiny day in and day out.

Manu knows she herself is responsible for this situation where each time she takes aim at the target with her weapon — air pistol or sports pistol — she is supposed to hit the Bulls Eye. What happened in Tokyo was a nightmare not just for Manu but the entire Indian shooting contingent.

For shooting fans, it was like being part of a terrible dream, as if some kind of sorcery had happened and the shooters were flunking. Manu, too, competing in three events at the Olympics, failed, if that be the right word. If you tell people that even Abhinav Bindra and Gagan Narang needed the experience of a few Olympics before winning a medal, they will still say "Manu failed in Tokyo."

In India, we put champions on the pedestal when they do well. And when they are not doing well, they are brought down to terra firma with a thud and trampled upon.

What Manu has done in the Junior World Championship is praiseworthy. Perhaps, the best thing she has learnt in her career is to ignore critics and focus on her own training.

At a time when the National Rifle Association of India has not yet found time to conduct a "post mortem" into what went wrong in Tokyo, Manu has picked herself up well and come up with medals. There are still a few harsh critics who feel her score in the air pistol event was not good enough. Hello, she has at least shown to us what it means to be winning medals again.

When Manu exploded on the big stage three years ago, it was perhaps easier. Be it the Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast in 2018 and then the ISSF World Cup after that, Manu was the girl who could do no wrong. When she was picked for three events at the Olympics, the verdict was out: She would not be able to handle the pressure.

So, does going to a Junior World Championship lessen the pressure? Certainly not. If anything, the pressure was very much in Lima too, as she had been supposed to be like the heavyweight champion in the ring throwing the punches.

That Manu rediscovered her winning touch is proof she has conquered the demons. Negativity is something which has haunted Manu for the last three years, since the time she did not do well in the 2018 Asian Games in Palembang. It requires perverts to celebrate the failures of Manu, and there are many in India who have riled and ridiculed the young lass when she has failed.

Few have given it a thought what damage they are doing to her psyche. To be sure, after the lows of the Tokyo Olympics, if there were people who stood by Manu closely, it was definitely her own family. Her father, Ramkishan Bhaker, a Merchant Navy engineer by profession, is blamed for being intrusive and poking his nose in many issues.

Yet, as father of a young champion, dad Bhaker deserves encomium for ensuring he wrapped his daughter in cotton wool, took her away from New Delhi and her hometown Jhajjar, Haryana, for a holiday break.

Away from the shooting ranges, spending time in bucolic backgrounds in Kerala, and pristine beauty of the hills in Ooty, seemed to have had a therapeutic value for Manu and the family. And when she was picked to compete in the Lima championship, a national coach masquerading as an expert was trying to convince her not to go for the championship!

It is believed this coach, who played havoc with her training schedule in Zagreb before the Olympics, wanted Manu to stay away from shooting for a full two months! Had that been the case, Manu may have forgotten what it is to hold a pistol in her hand.

This is where the mental part comes into play. Manu did not get bogged down by negativity. She joined the camp along with another 83 shooters at the Karni Singh ranges before boarding the long flight to Peru. The results in the form of medals are there to see.

There are cynics who question if someone aiming for Olympic glory needs to be shooting at junior events. Fact is, any shooting match gives the marksman the competitive edge and sets the adrenaline flowing. Lima has done wonders for Manu and she knows very well that the next 11 months will again be very busy for her.

Had she taken the bizarre advice from a coach, she may have been twiddling her thumbs. No, Manu has hit the ground running. From here till the Hangzhou Asian Games next year in China, it will be a testing period for Manu. She will be competing in the ISSF World Cup Finals next month and then the National Championship in December.

In 2022, she will again be part of selection trials and more events. She has the hunger to again be part of at least four events in the Asian Games. That, of course, is subject to performance, as the junior talent pool is now so rich.

What Manu needs is not words of solace. She needs a good coach to help her out, as after the Olympics, she has resurrected herself on her own. Given the politics being played out by coaches in India and the NRAI not in control of proceedings, Manu and all other shooters need foreign coaches of calibre.

One has seen what damage the Indian coaches did to the Indian shooters before the Olympics. Manu is just 19 and there is a lifetime ahead of her. However, if the shortened Olympic circle is taken into account, the sooner a good pistol coach from abroad is found the more helpful it will be. The Paris Olympics are less than three years away.

Perhaps, the time has come when the Sports Authority of India needs to play its proactive role and find the right coaches from overseas. Sadly, the NRAI seems to be in sleep mode at the moment after holding its election in September in Mohali.

Views expressed are personal