Anil Manohar Mohod makes cardboard boxes for sweet shops in Amravati. It is how the family gets by. Last Sunday, when his 17-year-old daughter Kumkum won the women’s team gold at the Archery World Cup Stage 2 in Shanghai — India’s first women’s team gold since 2021 — he picked up the phone and called Raghuvir Mithaiyan, one of his clients, to order sweet boxes.
Not to deliver them. To receive them.
“Sweet boxes banane se hi ghar chalta hai aur Kumkum ki archery bhi (It is the sweet boxes that run our home, and so does Kumkum’s archery),” he told The Indian Express. “She was shooting in Shanghai with a second-hand bow, which she has been using for the last five years. And when she won the team gold, I called Raghuvir Mithaiyan sweets — for whom I once made boxes — to order sweets to celebrate. Kumkum’s passion has been archery and what more can we ask than to see her shining on the world stage.”
The bow is five years old. It is the second second-hand bow Kumkum has used since she started the sport in 2018. Her first bow was wooden, bought with Rs 3,000 given by her grandmother Kusum Mohod. Six months after picking it up, she won a silver medal at the sub-junior nationals in Vijayawada. A second-hand recurve bow followed, sourced from an archer in Nasik. Then another in 2020. When Kumkum came under the Khelo India scheme, her father drove her to training on his motorcycle — the shared auto had cost Rs 5,000 a month, and when the other children dropped out, the family could no longer split the fare. When she won medals, he would stop some of his orders to celebrate.
The Indian team of Ankita Bhakat, Deepika Kumari and Kumkum Mohod pose after winning the title in the Women’s team recurve final in the World Cup Shanghai Stage 2 on Sunday. World Archery
“Yes, it’s tough,” Anil says. “But if we cannot make sacrifices for her, who else will.”
It was her mother Rupali who had started it all. In 2018, a relative’s daughter had taken up archery at coach Prafull Dange’s Radhey Archery Academy in Amravati. Rupali insisted — their only child would try it too. Dange saw something immediately.
“When she came to train under me, I was impressed with her stubbornness to learn. Her upper body strength, her shoulder position — things like getting the body in T-shape, pulling the bow with the back muscles, Kumkum learnt very quickly. During Covid, we worked on short-distance shooting, something most archers avoid. It helped her use her back muscles to draw the bow automatically.”
The rise has been steady, each tournament taking her a step further. Last year’s nationals brought a bronze with the Maharashtra team. At the Asia Cup in Bangkok — her first appearance in an Indian team — she lost in the second round individually but the experience settled something. At the World Cup in Mexico, she went a round further. In Shanghai, in qualification, her score of 651 made her the second-best Indian in the squad, behind Bhakat’s 652 and ahead of Kumari’s 651. She belonged.
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Individually, she lost in the fourth round to Alejandra Trujillo of Mexico — world number five, two-time Olympic bronze medallist. The team, though, was a different story. India’s gold saw them rise four spots in world rankings, to fifth.
In the semi-final against Korea, Kumkum shot an average of 9.5 as India won 5-1 — only the fourth time the Indian women’s team has defeated them. In the final against China, her average was 9.22, matching Deepika Kumari. When it came to the deciding shoot-off, she shot a ten.
The Indian team of Ankita Bhakat, Deepika Kumari and Kumkum Mohod pose after winning the title in the Women’s team recurve final in the World Cup Shanghai Stage 2 on Sunday. World Archery
“This medal is a new start for me,” she said. “I feel I can do better than this. I believe whether a bow is second-hand or not, it does not matter. A bow is bow only and we have to shoot arrows. Apne par confidence aur ability par hi sab kuch matter karta hai (It all depends on one’s confidence and ability).”
She idolises Kang Chaeyoung, the world number one — the same archer India beat in the semi-final. “While I never think about who I am shooting against, the win against the Korean team was special,” Kumkum says. This week she heads to Sonepat for the Asian Games trials.
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“Post every competition, I send her videos of shooting techniques of various archers and she studies them for hours. Things like not dropping the hand after the release are the key and she has improved a lot. At Shanghai too, she shot amid pressure and windy conditions and handled it well,” says Dange.
Back in Amravati, Anil Mohod is already thinking about the next call. “With every medal, I have to call my old clients to order sweets,” he says, and laughs.
