Deepika Kumari Deepika (left) with Purnima Mahato at world cup final, Istanbul. Deepika Kumari (born 13 June 1994) is a young Indian athlete who competes in the event of Archery and is currently ranked World No. 1.[2][3] She was born in the city of Ranchi, in the state of Jharkhand, India. She won gold medal in the 2010 Commonwealth games in the women's individual recurve event. She also won gold medal in the same competition in the women's team recurve event along with Dola Banerjee and Bombayala Devi.[4] Kumari qualified for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, where she competed in the Women's Individual and Women's team events, finishing in eighth place in the latter.[5] She was conferred with Arjuna Award, India's second highest sporting award in the year 2012 by President of India Pranab Mukherjee.[6] Early life Deepika Kumari was born to Shivnarayan Mahato, an auto- rickshaw driver and Geeta Mahato, a nurse in Ranchi Medical College.[7] The parents stay at Ratu Chati village, 15 km away from Ranchi. Her mother says that she never used to miss her target while aiming for mangoes with stones in her childhood.[8] In the early days it was rather difficult for the parents to financially support Deepika's dream, often compromising on the family budget to buy her new equipments for her training. In fact, when her father came to know that she wanted to make a career in archery, he wasn't happy. But the young gutsy archer never gave up and started her practice with bamboo made bows and arrows. Finally it was Deepika's cousin Vidya Kumari, also an archer at Tata Archery Academy, who showed her the way. Career Deepika got her first breakthrough in 2005 when she entered Arjun Archery Academy, an institute set up by Meera Munda, wife of Chief Minister of the state Shri. Arjun Munda at Kharsawan. But her professional archery journey begun in the year 2006 when she joined the Tata Archery Academy in Jamshedpur. It was here that she started her training with proper equipment and uniform. She also received Rs 500 as stipend. Deepika visited her home in three years only after winning the cadet World Championship title in November 2009. Even when the national camp at the SAI Eastern Centre in Kolkata is not on, she checks into the hostel of the KMCT College in Ranchi, where she is studying arts in first year junior college.[9] Achievements Deepika become the second Indian to win the title after Palton Hansda won the World champion at Mérida (Mexico) in 2006 by winning the junior compound individual gold medal.[10] She won the 11th Youth World archery Championship held in Ogden, USA in 2009, at an age of 15 years. She also won a gold medal in the same competition in the women's team recurve event along with Dola Banerjee and Bombayala Devi. In the Delhi Commonwealth games 2010, Deepika won two gold medals, one in the individual event and other in the women's team recurve event. For this she was recently honoured with 'the Outstanding Performance at CWG (Female) award' at Sahara Sports Awards 2010. Later in the Asian games 2010, held in Guangzhou, China, Deepika missed out on a medal after she lost to Kwon Un Sil of North Korea in the bronze- medal play-off of the women's individual archery event. But as a part of the Indian archery recurve team, along with Rimil Buriuly and Dola Banerjee, Deepika edged out Chinese Taipei 218–217 in the bronze play-off to ensure a podium finish at the Aoti Archery Range. During the Jharkhand day celebrations, the government of Jharkhand, issued full page photos in leading local newspapers with Deepika showing off her gold medals along with India's cricket captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni who also comes from Ranchi.[11] In May 2012, Deepika Kumari won her first World Cup individual recurve gold medal at Antalya, Turkey. She beat Korea's Lee Sung Jin by six set points to four in the final.[12] Later in the year 2012 she became world no.1 in the Women's Recurve Archery. In London Olympics 2012, Deepika Kumari lost against Amy Oliver of Great Britain in the opening round.