Kolhapur (Maharashtra): There couldn’t have been a better pre-birthday gift for himself and the country as shooter Swapnil Kusale clinched the bronze in men’s 50m rifle 3 positions final at the Paris Olympics on Thursday — scripting history by bagging only the second Olympic medal for both Maharashtra and Kolhapur after a long gap of 72 years.
Ranked 12th in the world, Swapnil earned the honour just five days before his 29th birthday on August 6, making it a personal double-whammy.
As the news flashed on television on Thursday afternoon, Kolhapur erupted in joy, as his proud parents – schoolteacher Suresh Kusale and Sarpanch Anita Kusale – along with his brother and other relatives cheered with tears of happiness, brimming over with emotions.
The Kusales’ humble dwelling at Kambalwadi village became the epicentre for the celebrations with many youngsters and kids seen dancing, cheering, and clapping to express their admiration for ‘Aapla Swapnil’ (our Swapnil), their illustrious hero.
For both Kolhapur and Maharashtra, Swapnil brought the second individual Olympic medal after a lengthy wait of 72 years.
The legendary Khashaba Dadasaheb Jadhav (1926-1984) from Kolhapur secured Independent India’s first individual Olympic medal by winning the bronze in freestyle wrestling at the Helsinki Olympics in 1952.
Swapnil’s thorny journey to abrupt stardom is punctuated with lots of perspiration, shedding silent tears, quietly gulping disappointments, and confronting financial or other challenges at various levels for the past nearly 15 years since he developed a passion for shooting, with a cool, never-say-die attitude.
“Swapnil was always dedicated and hard-working… He was absolutely focused on his ultimate goal. He never bothered about holidays or festivals or such diversions. This (bronze) is the reward for all his silent struggles and sacrifices for the past so many years,” said his proud father Suresh Kusale, fighting back the flood of joy welling up in his eyes.
“Right from his childhood, he had that spark and passion for sports… He was extremely self-disciplined and achieved this with the blessings of Lord Pandurang. We are very happy for him and the laurels he has brought to the country,” said proud mom Anita Kusale.
His elderly grandmother also flashed a grin with a large red tilak/bindi on her forehead and thick spectacles which emitted her thrill at her grandson’s feat.
“He has exceeded all our expectations…,” she said.
Beaming sibling Suraj said: “I am proud to be his brother…He had the whole country’s goodwill and best wishes with him when he qualified for the event.”
Hailing from a nondescript village and catapulted to the world stage, Swapnil’s father Suresh Kusale narrated briefly the travails of his determined son — how he remained away from the family from the age of 10 at a boarding school, then to the famed Bhonsala Military School (Nashik), the Sports Prabodhini Yojana and so on.
He also took a loan to finance a good rifle for his promising young lad.
For almost eight years, Swapnil practised on an old German-make rifle as a new one was beyond the family’s reach. But after he won a silver at the National Games in Kerala in 2015, he landed a job with the Central Railways as a TTE in Pune under sports quota.
“That caught the nation’s eyes and our financial situation also eased, enabling him to concentrate on the bigger goal of Olympics, which he narrowly missed in 2021 (Tokyo). But he finally achieved his dream and made it to Paris,” said Suresh Kusale.
The rest is history.
His coach Deepali Deshpande (54) said she never had “any doubts in Swapnil’s abilities and talent to reach the final, as he was meant for Olympics”.
According to his family, as quoted by local media, Swapnil is a religious and patriotic person, sports an artistic ‘trishul’ tattoo of ‘MahaMrityunjaya Mantra’ on his back, has ‘Bharat’ printed on his rifle, and always relishes a simple meal of ‘bhakri-and-methi bhaji’, prepared by his mother with dollops of love…
