Abhinav Bindra (born 28 September 1982) is a retired Indian sport shooter. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics he became the first Indian to win an individual Olympic gold medal, in the 10-metre air rifle. He was also world champion in 2006 and won seven Commonwealth Games medals. Since retiring in 2016 he has become an influential sports administrator and entrepreneur. He sits on the International Olympic Committee’s Athletes’ Commission and received the Olympic Order in 2024.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Abhinav Apjit Bindra |
| Born | 28 September 1982, Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India |
| Age | 44 |
| Sport | Shooting (10 m air rifle) |
| Olympic medal | Gold, Beijing 2008 |
| Olympics | 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016 |
| Education | The Doon School; St. Stephen’s School, Chandigarh |
| Career | 1998–2016 |
Early Life
Bindra was born in Dehradun into a Punjabi Sikh family. His father, Apjit Singh Bindra, was a businessman who built him a private shooting range at the family home. He studied at The Doon School and St. Stephen’s School in Chandigarh and took up shooting as a teenager. At 15 he became the youngest member of India’s team at the 1998 Commonwealth Games.
Career
Bindra competed at the 2000 Sydney Olympics as the youngest member of India’s team and received the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna in 2001. He won gold at the 2002 and 2006 Commonwealth Games, and in 2006 he became the first Indian to win the World Shooting Championships.
On 11 August 2008 Bindra won the 10-metre air rifle event at the Beijing Olympics with a final score of 700.5. It was India’s first individual Olympic gold medal, and he remained the only Indian with one until Neeraj Chopra won in Tokyo in 2021.
Bindra competed at the 2012 London Olympics and won more Commonwealth Games medals, including gold in Glasgow in 2014. He was India’s flag bearer at the 2016 Rio Olympics, where he narrowly missed a medal in fourth place. He retired shortly afterwards.
After Shooting
Bindra runs the technology company Abhinav Futuristics and founded the Abhinav Bindra Foundation to support sports science and athlete development in India. In 2020 the foundation opened a sports medicine institute in Bhubaneswar. He has served on the IOC Athletes’ Commission since 2018. His autobiography, A Shot at History, was published in 2011. He was a torchbearer for the Paris 2024 Olympics.
Awards and Honours
Frequently Asked Questions
When and where was Abhinav Bindra born?
Abhinav Bindra was born on 28 September 1982 in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India and is 44 years old.
Featured image: Abhinav Bindra with Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. Photo by Government of Odisha, licensed under CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
