Ravi Dahiya brings home silver; Deepak Punia misses bronze

India’s Bajrang Punia won his quarterfinal bout by fall against Morteza Ghiasi of Iran in the men’s freestyle 65kg category this morning and qualified for the semi-finals where he will take on Haji Aliyev of Azerbaijan later in the day.

Meanwhile, Indian wrestler Ravi Dahiya took home the silver medalafter narrowly losing 4-7 in the men’s freestyle 57kg final to ROC’s Zavur Uguev on Thursday.

With his second-place finish, Ravi Dahiya became only the second Indian wrestler to win silver at the Olympics after Sushil Kumar. Sushil had won the silver at the London Games in 2012.

Another Indian wrestler Deepak Punia came agonisingly close to winning a bronze medal on his Olympic debut but conceded a take-down in last 10 seconds of the 86kg play-off against San Marino’s Myles Nazem Amine to miss out on achieving the feat yesterday.

Deepak’s defence was superb throughout the bout but the San Marino wrestler grabbed the decisive two-pointer after getting hold of the Indian’s right leg and converted it into a take-down in dying moments of the bout. The 22-year-old Indian, son of a milk peddler in a Haryana village, was leading 2-1 before that take-down but it was not meant to be his day.