Paralympic swimmers of India qualified with their talent and with their valiant heart and hunger for victory made them special in the field of sports. Some of the famous Paralympic swimmers in India are Sharath M. Gayakwad, Niranjan Mukundan, Parasanta Karmakar and Murlikant Petkar.
Popular Paralympics swimmers of India
Following are the famous Paralympics swimmers of India:
Murlikant Petkar: Murlikant Petkar, a para swimmer won an individual gold medal in the 1972 Paralympics, in Heidelberg, which was held in Germany. He set a world record in the 50m freestyle swimming event, at 37.33 seconds. In the same game, Murlikant Petkar participated in javelin, precision javelin throw and slalom. He was a finalist in all three events.
Sharath M. Gayakwad: Sharath M. Gayakwad is an Indian Paralympics swimmer from Bengaluru. At the 2014 Asian Games, Sharath M. Gayakwad broke the record of PT Usha, being a disabled for most number of medals by an Indian at any multi-discipline event by winning 6 medals. He has over 30 international and 40 national medals to his credit, one of them being the bronze medal at the 2010 Asian Para Games. He is the first Indian swimmer to qualify for the Paralympics and competed in the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London. He has been receiving both monetary and non-monetary support from the Go Sports Foundation, Bengaluru since 2011.
Niranjan Mukundan: Niranjan Mukundan who is also known as N. Mukundan was born on 4th September 1994 in Bengaluru, Karnataka. Niranjan Mukundan is an Indian para-swimmer and trains with fellow Go Sports Foundation scholar and London 2012 paralympian Sharath Gayakwad, under the Coach John Christopher.
Prasanta Karmakar: He is an Indian Para swimmer. He was born in Kolkata, West Bengal. He was coached by Pradeep Kumar in Bengaluru. He was honoured with the prestigious Arjuna award for 2010 in the disabled sports category. He is the son of a taxi driver who lost his hand in a road accident.
Suyash Jadhav: He is an Indian Para swimmer, challenging in the S7 Category. He is the only Indian Para swimmer to have achieved the "A" qualifying mark for the 2016 Paralympics in Rio, and is being supported by the Go Sports Foundation through the Para Champions Programme in front of his Paralympics pursuit.
Vishwas KS: In 2015 Vishwas won 4 silver medals at the state level and 3 silver medals at the national level para-swimming competition. Then Sports Authority of India (SAI) chose him to participate in Canada, where he made India proud by winning three medals (2 silver and 1 bronze) at the 2016 Speedo Can-Am Para-swimming Championships.
Kanchanmala Pandey: She has so far won more than 110 medals, including six at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games, nine at the Asian Games and 50 at the state level. She has also featured into Hindi television series titled `Nazar Ya Nazariya` and `Yeh Hai Raushni ka Karvan`.
Paralympics swimmers in India lead a life like other common people, though they have a disability in their physic.
