Vaishnavi Girish Ramdas, 16, will be taking a year off from academics, after her Class XII exams, so she can focus on pistol shooting. “Vaishnavi wants to be on the Indian team,” says her mother Shri Shakthi Girish, a Chennai-based entrepreneur. “When you have a passion, something like college may interrupt you. As parents, we felt one could always go back to college when you are older.” The teen is now looking at colleges in the U.S. with shooting ranges attached to them.
In Nagpur, Namrata Deshmukh stopped practising as a gynaecologist so she could travel with her daughter Divya for her chess tournaments. A former World Under-10 champion, she won an individual bronze at the Chennai Chess Olympiad recently.
