a trail of camel carts loaded with fresh jaggery greets travellers on nh9 signalling that meerut is near rolling farms of tall sugarcane crops come in the frame the sweet smell of molasses burning in mills announces ones arrival in the countrys sugar bowl a region that is driving the sport of shootingalong the way almost all know where teen shooter saurabh chaudharys home in the small village of kalina is even 80 km away from the destination the junior world record holder youth olympics gold medallist asian games champion and multiple senior world cup victor in pistol shooting is now a poster boy in large swathes of uttar pradesh saurabh 18 is already being seen as indias best shot at the 2020 olympicsindias shooters have bested traditional heavyweights china and the us the genesis of the surge many say lies in the 2016 policy of allowing the lower agegroup shooters to be eligible for the senior category shooting they say has grown younger since saurabhs mother brijesh devi a homemaker isnt acquainted with english but words such as national camp manual target and mental toughness flow effortlessly in her conversation with her younger son representing india at the world level these are household phrasesbut its been quite a journey though the chaudharys now have a personal range in their backyard there was a time when saurabh used to place the target in his bedroom taking aim standing in his parents room across we had to get a range made at home the village academy is always crowded it gets difficult for him to train in peace his mother said a passage runs between the rooms so we would stop walking when he practised a new range is what he neededfirearms and up have a close relationship union home ministry statistics for 2018 showed the state has the most number of active licences 1277 lakh not surprising that it sends almost 1000 entries for the riflepistol nationals each year 25 of the total entries meerut and baghpat in west up contribute a major chunk hundreds of shooters mostly in their early teens can be seen practising at the 25odd shooting ranges within 80km radius of the two districts saurabh used to practise at the academy veer shahmal rifle club in binauli but the range is always overcrowded said amit sheoran saurabhs coach i started the academy with three shooters in 2012 but there are over 40 kids today sheoran and some friends run three more academiesthe veer shahmal rifle club itself is a mere 10x15 feet room it hosts around 30 shooters at a time only eight get to train at the targets while the rest do the holding practice clutching a brick equivalent to a pistols weight to get used to the weapon space is the biggest challenge but numbers increase every monththe love for guns in these parts is not new meerut lawyer pesh nawaz khan 80 said it has seeds both in