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New Delhi. Sunday became a historic day for Indian Archery. India's star recurve archer Dheeraj Bommadevara has done a feat by winning the gold medal in the World Cup Final, which no Indian male recurve archer could do before. Dheeraj won the gold medal by defeating Nakanishi Junya of Japan through shoot-off in a very exciting match. With his brilliant victory, the 16-year long wait in Indian men's recurve archery also ended.

25 year old Dheeraj performed brilliantly throughout the tournament. This army soldier, who is ranked 10th in the world ranking, showed his accurate shooting power in the quarter-finals and semi-finals. In the final, he faced world number 20 Japanese archer Nakanishi Junya. The match lasted for five sets and there was a tough competition between the two players. After five sets the score was tied at 5-5. After this, the decision was taken by shoot-off where Dheeraj won by a margin of 10-9 and captured the gold medal.

This achievement of Dheeraj is also special because earlier the dream of gold medal for the Indian male recurve archer in the World Cup final had remained unfulfilled. Jayant Talukdar from India won the bronze medal in the World Cup final in Edinburgh in 2010. After this, Indian male recurve archers could not win gold in this prestigious competition for a long time. Now Dheeraj has made history by ending that drought.

Behind Dheeraj's success lies not only his talent but also the struggle and sacrifice of his family. In the initial phase of his career, the financial condition of the family was not good. In the year 2017, he needed expensive foreign equipment for better training but lack of money became a big challenge. The situation reached such a stage that Dheeraj's mother Revati even mortgaged her mangalsutra to fulfill her son's dream. With this amount a new bow was bought for him.

At one time Dheeraj had made up his mind to quit archery but the trust of his family gave him the strength to move ahead. His father Shravan Kumar is also associated with archery and is among the senior archery judges of Andhra Pradesh. It is this support from his family and patient hard work that has made him one of the top archers in the world today.

Dheeraj indicated his great form by winning two gold medals at the World Cup Stage Three in Antalya, Turkey in June this year. Now by winning gold in the World Cup final, he has registered his name in the history of Indian archery. Earlier in the World Cup final, Dola Banerjee had won the gold medal for India in the women's individual category in 2007. Dheeraj's victory has made India's flag the highest in the men's category as well.