School Teacher Father Took Rs 10 Lakh Loan To Make Aditi Swami Youngest-Ever World Champion In Archery

Many obstacles came in front of young Aditi Swami. But every time, her father Gopichand was there to tackle them. Covid-19 lockdown, financial burdens and what not. Nothing stopped Aditi from becomeing a world champion.

Aditi Swami. Remember the name. At just 17, she has scripted history. This young archer from Satara district in Maharashtra has etched her name in history books. At the World Archery Championships, Aditi became the youngest-ever senior world champion. Not just that, she is also the firsy Indian to win an individual compound gold medal at the worlds.

Earlier, Aditi had won another gold at the World Championships in the women's compound team event with Jyothi Surekha. it is fair to say that India's future in Archery looks bright with Aditi, Parneet Kaur securing medals.

Aditi is daughter of government employees. Her father Gopichand is a maths school teacher in a government school in Satara. He had moved to Satara from a nearby village to ensure his  daughter's career was on the right track. Gopichand, right from the start, wanted to make his daughter an athlete. 

A 12-year-old Aditi was taken to the Shahu stadium in Satara. She has not decided her the sport she wanted to excel by then. Her eyes fell on the athletes playing Archery.

Gopichand got her enrolled into Archery. He assumes that the reason Aditi took up sport was because this sport suited her. "She was quite thin and didn’t like sports which were seen as physical.I think she liked archery as it’s a sport where one has to be extremely calculative," Gopichand told Indian Express.

The archery academy was run by coach Pravin Sawant in the sugarcane field. Aditi trained here for 3 hours a day from Monday to Friday. On Saturday and Sundays, she would give two extra hours to the training. 

It was not going to be easy for Aditi to pursue her sport as it demanded a financial support. Gopichand had to take loans to ensure Aditi got her own bow and arrows. A bow costs Rs 2.5 lakh while the bows come for around Rs 50,000. When this obstacle was crossed, another came up, in form of Covid-19 and a lockdown was imposed in the country. During Lockdown days, Aditi would train in front of her house. The training did not stop.

Aditi started taking part in the tournaments and Gopichand kept taking loans to keep her career going. The loan amount soon became Rs 10 lakh. Her father's half salary today goes in paying off the debt. But he has no regrets if Aditi continues to win medals and make world records.