Samresh Jung grabbed an Olympics quota place at the fourth and last ISSF World Cup at Munich, Germany on Wednesday.
Jung fired a total of 682.1 to finish fourth in a tense men’s 10M air pistol final after a tie-shoot, becoming the first Indian ever to bag an Olympic quota in men’s pistol shooting.
The Melbourne Commonwealth Games champion fired 584 in the qualification and 98.1 in the final round.
“This is the first-ever direct entry in Olympics for an Indian pistol shooter,” National Rifle Association of India General Secretary Rajiv Bhatia told PTI.
“Earlier, Jaspal Rana had got a wildcard entry in the 1996 Atlanta Games and among women Abha Dhillon had also been given a wildcard before,” he said.
Jung became the eighth Indian after Abhinav Bindra, Gagan Narang, Anjali Bhagwat, Avneet Kaur Sidhu, Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, Manavjeet Singh Sandhu and Sanjeev Rajput to qualify for the 2008 Games to be staged in Beijing.
Jung had come close to winning the Olympic berth in the previous ISSF World Cup in Bangkok, Thailand, where also he had shot 584 to finish eighth.

Not lucky
Jung’s compatriot Tejaswini Sawant was not lucky enough to hit the bull’s eye as she missed the quota in the women’s sport rifle three position event by just one point.
Tejaswini shot a total of 580 (prone 192, standing 192 and kneeling 193) to finish ninth among 97 shooters.
Sonja Pfeilschiefter of Germany won the gold medal with a top score of 688.7 (588+100.7) points while Sylwia Bogacka of Poland bagged the silver after carding 684.1 (582+102.1) and Barbara Lechner of Germany took home the bronze at 683.2 (583+100.2) points.