Winning an Olympic medal is my target: Deepa Karmakar

Deepa Karmakar, who made history recently by becoming the first Indian ever to qualify for the finals of World Gymnastics Championships, returned to her home state Tripura on Friday and expressed her next target will be to bring laurels for the country from the Olympics. Deepa and her coach Bishweswar Nandi were given a warm welcome by a large number of fans at the Agartala airport while hundreds waited on the road that led to the airport.

Published : Nov 07, 2015 00:18 IST , Agartala

In the Women’s Vault Final of 2015 World Gymnastics Championships, the 22-year-old girl finished fifth in a strong field of eight gymnasts, which included individual all-round champion and last two years' silver medalist in vault, Simone Biles of the US.
In the Women’s Vault Final of 2015 World Gymnastics Championships, the 22-year-old girl finished fifth in a strong field of eight gymnasts, which included individual all-round champion and last two years' silver medalist in vault, Simone Biles of the US.
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In the Women’s Vault Final of 2015 World Gymnastics Championships, the 22-year-old girl finished fifth in a strong field of eight gymnasts, which included individual all-round champion and last two years' silver medalist in vault, Simone Biles of the US.

Deepa Karmakar, who made history recently by becoming the first Indian ever to qualify for the finals of World Gymnastics Championships, returned to her home state Tripura on Friday and expressed her next target will be to bring laurels for the country from the Olympics.

Deepa and her coach Bishweswar Nandi were given a warm welcome by a large number of fans at the Agartala airport while hundreds waited on the road that led to the airport.

In the Women’s Vault Final of 2015 World Gymnastics Championships, the 22-year-old girl finished fifth in a strong field of eight gymnasts, which included individual all-round champion and last two years' silver medalist in vault, Simone Biles of the US.

The ‘Golden Girl’ of Tripura was also felicitated during a small programme organised by the Tripura Sports Council and the State government where Chief Minister Manik Sarkar, giving full-scale praise to Deepa for her splendid success in the recently concluded event in Glasgow city, said the girl will bring more laurels for the nation in the coming years.

Deepa said, “I am not happy as the result is not up to my expectation but at the same time I am feeling good since I am the first Indian to qualify for the finals of the World Gymnastics Championships and rose to from seventh to the fifth rank where some 87 countries had participated. My next target is to get medal from Olympics.”

As recognition to her success besides cash award of Rs. 20 lakh (15 lakh from the Tripura Cricket Association and 5 lakh from the Tripura government), Deepa has been promoted from physical instructor to the sports officer in the Sports Department while her coach Bisweswar Nandi has been promoted to the rank of Deputy Director in the same department.

Mayor of Agartala Municipal Corporation (AMC) Dr. Prafullajit Sinha, Sports and Youth Affairs Minister Sahid Chowdhury and Secretary to the Sports and Youth Affairs department Samarjit Bhowmik were also present in the programme.

Meanwhile, Deepa’s coach feels they got very less time for practice and hope this time the SAI starts the pre-Olympics camp early so that there is enough time for preparation.

“As a coach I am not happy that we did not get enough time for practice before the world championship. The US, Russia, Scotland and England plan three to three-and-a-half years before the event but we got only five months. This time the second vault was very tough but for that we had just two-and-a-half month’s time. However, the coaches of the eight other nations, who were in the final, praised me and Deepa for her performance and according to them she is very talented,” said coach Nandi.

In the Commonwealth Games 2014, Karmakar won bronze medal in the same event, becoming the first Indian woman Gymnast to do so. This August, she also won bronze medal at the Hiroshima Asian Championships.

Since 2007, Deepa has won 77 medals including 67 golds.

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