Young Indian shooter Arjun Babuta on Monday beat Tokyo Olympic silver medalist Lukas Kozenski to win the men's 10m air rifle gold medal in the men's 10m air rifle event to open the country's medal tally at the ISSF Shooting World Cup.

In the gold medal match, Arjun easily defeated Kozenski of America 17-9. This is Arjun's first gold medal with the senior team. He won the gold medal at the 2016 Junior World Cup in Gabala, Azerbaijan. Arjun, 23, from Punjab has been representing India since 2016. Earlier, he had managed to make it to the gold medal bout while topping the ranking round with 261.1 points. Kozensky made it to the gold medal bout with a score of 260.4 while Sergei Richter, 33, of Israel, who topped the qualification, won the bronze with a score of 259.9.

Another Indian participating in the event, Parth Makhija, finished fourth with a score of 258.1. He made a stellar performance on Sunday to make it to the ranking round with a fifth place. In the final, Arjun did not give any chance to Kozenski. He took a 10-4 lead after seven series of one shots. The winner of each series gets two points and points are distributed in case of a tie. The shooter who scores the first 16 points is declared the winner.

The American player did not give up but Arjun scored more than 10 points on crucial occasions and opened India's medal account in the competition with a gold medal. This is the first medal for foreign rifle coach Thomas Farnick in his very first international tournament. This Austrian coach was added to the team just before the Changwan World Cup.