Asian Para Games 2026: Nishad Kumar, Ajeet Singh Yadav Among India's Key Medal Contenders On Day 1

India will look to make a strong start to its medal campaign on Day 1 of the 2026 Asian Para Games today, with several prominent athletes competing across para athletics, para swimming, para powerlifting, para archery and para shooting. Paralympic medallists Nishad Kumar and Ajeet Singh Yadav, along with world champion Rinku Hooda, will lead India's challenge in para athletics, while Indian athletes will also seek podium finishes in para swimming and para powerlifting. In para archery, seasoned campaigners Harvinder Singh and Sheetal Devi, along with Payal Nag, will look to make a strong start to their respective campaigns and secure medals for India. In para shooting, Avani Lekhara will lead the country's challenge as Indian athletes aim to add to the medal tally.

Here is the schedule of Indian athletes at the Asian Para Games 2026 on October 19:

04:30 AM: Para Archery - Harvinder Singh and Vijay Sundi in Men's Recurve Individual, Doubles and Mixed Ranking Round

04:30 AM: Para Archery - Sheetal Devi and Payal Nag in Women's Compound Individual, Doubles and Mixed Ranking Round

04:30 AM: Para Archery - Swati Chaudhary in Women's W1 Individual and Mixed Ranking Round

05:30 AM: Para Badminton - Nitesh Kumar / Thulasimathi Murugesan vs Chen Pengfei / Huang Zixuan (China) in Mixed Doubles SL3-SU5 Group B

05:35 AM: Para Badminton - Ruthick Ragupathi / Manasi Joshi vs Khian Urbano / Kathleen Pedrosa (Philippines) in Mixed Doubles SL3-SU5 Group C

06:00 AM: Para Badminton - Prem Kumar Ale vs Muhammad Bin Ramli (Malaysia) in Men's Singles WH1 Group A

06:15 AM: Para Badminton - Sudarsan Muthusamy vs Dimas Tri Aji (Indonesia) in Men's Singles SH6 Group B

06:20 AM: Para Badminton - Krishna Nagar vs Lin Naili (China) in Men's Singles SH6 Group C

06:30 AM: Para Shooting - Swaroop Unhalkar, Rakesh Nidagundi and Anandha Krishnan in Men's R1 10m Air Rifle Standing SH1 Qualification

06:30 AM: Para Shooting - Avani Lekhara and Mona Agarwal in Women's R2 10m Air Rifle Standing SH1 Qualification

06:35 AM: Para Table Tennis - Baby Sahana Ravi vs Altynay Yerzhankyzy (Kazakhstan) in Women's Singles Class 9 Group B

06:35 AM: Para Table Tennis - Sonalben Patel vs Chao Pei-hsi (Chinese Taipei) in Women's Singles Class 3 Group B

07:00 AM: Para Badminton - Sivarajan Solaimalai vs Faiq Zali (Brunei) in Men's Singles SH6 Group D

07:05 AM: Para Badminton - Pramod Bhagat vs Lee Seunghu (South Korea) in Men's Singles SL3 Group B

07:05 AM: Boccia - Anjali Devi vs Choi Ye Jin (South Korea) in Women's Individual BC3 Pool A

07:05 AM: Boccia - Sachin Chamaria vs Kazuki Takahashi (Japan) in Men's Individual BC3 Pool A

07:19 AM: Para Cycling - Arshad Shaikh in Men's C1-2 3000m Individual Pursuit Qualifying

07:30 AM: Para Table Tennis - Ekta Bhyan vs Eun Hee Kim (South Korea) in Women's Singles Class 1 Group A

07:32 AM: Para Swimming - Swatik Patil in Men's 200m Individual Medley SM9 Heats

07:45 AM: Para Badminton - Naveen Sivakumar vs Sunwoo Jeon (South Korea) in Men's Singles SL4 Group A

07:45 AM: Para Badminton - Umesh Kumar vs Yi Yuzhe (China) in Men's Singles SL3 Group C

07:50 AM: Para Badminton - Sukant Kadam vs Sanjeewa Madduma (Sri Lanka) in Men's Singles SL4 Group B

08:50 AM: Para Table Tennis - Savita Ajjanakatti vs Asako Kurashimo (Japan) in Women's Singles Class 8 Group A

08:50 AM: Para Table Tennis - Jehan Madan vs Hyeonuk Kim (South Korea) in Men's Singles Class 1 Group A

08:50 AM: Para Table Tennis - Sandeep Dangi vs Rakan Al-Salmi (Saudi Arabia) in Men's Singles Class 1 Group A

08:50 AM: Para Table Tennis - Prachi Pandey vs Kanokporn Phathumchai (Thailand) in Women's Singles Class 6 Group A

09:00 AM: Blind Football - India vs Thailand in Men's Preliminary Round

09:15 AM: Para Archery - Bhawna Choudhary and Pooja Jatyan in Women's Recurve Individual, Doubles and Mixed Ranking Round

09:15 AM: Para Archery - Shyam Sundar Swami and Toman Kumar in Men's Compound Individual, Doubles and Mixed Ranking Round

09:15 AM: Para Archery - Amol Vinayak Breed and Adil Ansari in Men's W1 Individual and Mixed Ranking Round

09:15 AM: Para Badminton - Nitesh Kumar vs Dongjae Joo (South Korea) in Men's Singles SL3 Group A

10:00 AM: Para Badminton - Ruthick Ragupathi vs Pricha Somsiri (Thailand) in Men's Singles SU5 Group C

10:30 AM: Para Badminton - Rakesh Pandey vs Fang Jen-yu (Chinese Taipei) in Men's Singles SU5 Group B

10:30 AM: Para Badminton - Abhijeet Sakhuja vs Prakash Adhikari (Nepal) in Men's Singles SL4 Group F

10:45 AM: Para Badminton - Hubaida Abu / Prem Kumar Ale vs Daiki Kajiwara / Keita Nishimura (Japan) in Men's Doubles WH1-WH2 Group A

11:15 AM: Para Badminton - Suryakant Yadav vs Chen Pengfei (China) in Men's Singles SL4 Group C

11:15 AM: Para Badminton - Suhas Lalinakere vs Fredy Setiawan (Indonesia) in Men's Singles SL4 Group E

11:30 AM: Para Badminton - Shanthiya Vishwanathan vs Yang Quixia (China) in Women's Singles SU5 Group A

11:35 AM: Para Athletics - Suchitra Parida in Women's Javelin Throw F55/F56 Qualification

12:00 PM: Para Badminton - Sukant Kadam / Pramod Bhagat vs Suryo Nugroho / Muh Al Imran (Indonesia) in Men's Doubles SL3-SU5 Group D

12:05 PM: Boccia - Sachin Chamaria vs Howon Jeong (South Korea) in Men's Individual BC3 Pool A

12:30 PM: Para Badminton - Nithya Sre Sumathy Sivan vs Apriliyana Sulistyawati (Indonesia) in Women's Singles SH6 Group A

12:30 PM: Para Badminton - Thulasimathi Murugesan vs Wong Lai Ming (Hong Kong, China) in Women's Singles SU5 Group B

12:45 PM: Para Badminton - Manisha Ramdass vs Warining Rahayu (Indonesia) in Women's Singles SU5 Group A

12:45 PM: Para Badminton - Mandeep Kaur vs Zuxian Xiao (China) in Women's Singles SL3 Group C

01:00 PM: Para Badminton - Alphia James vs Amnouy Wetwithan (Thailand) in Women's Singles WH2 Group B

01:00 PM: Para Powerlifting - Jaspreet Kaur in Women's 45kg Final (Medal Event)

01:30 PM: Para Badminton - Nitesh Kumar / Ruthick Ragupathi vs Seunghu Lee / Jeongsoo Lee (South Korea) in Men's Doubles SL3-SU5 Group C

01:30 PM: Para Badminton - Hardik Makkar vs Tay Wei Ming (Singapore) in Men's Singles SU5 Group F

01:30 PM: Para Swimming - Gopichand Lingutla and Niranjan Mukundan in Men's 400m Freestyle S7 Final (Medal Event)

01:38 PM: Para Swimming - Vaishnavi Jagtap in Women's 400m Freestyle S8 Final (Medal Event)

01:40 PM: Para Athletics - Nishad Kumar in Men's Long Jump T47 Final (Medal Event)

01:45 PM: Para Badminton - Mythili Haris vs Mohammed Alameer (Iraq) in Men's Singles WH2 Group E

02:00 PM: Para Badminton - Suryakant Yadav / Naveen Sivakumar vs Mohammad Ali Imam / Joytu Dhar (Bangladesh) in Men's Doubles SU5 Group B

02:10 PM: Para Athletics - Deepthi Jeevanji in Women's 400m T20 Round 1 Heats

02:15 PM: Para Badminton - Neeraj vs Siti Mat Lawani (Malaysia) in Women's Singles SL3 Group C

02:30 PM: Para Badminton - Hubaida Abu / Pallavi Kaluvehalli vs Qu Zimo / Liu Yutong (China) in Mixed Doubles WH1-WH2 Group B

02:30 PM: Para Powerlifting - Manish Kumar and Paramjeet Kumar in Men's 59kg Final (Medal Event)

02:47 PM: Para Swimming - Himanshu Nandal in Men's 100m Backstroke S11 Final (Medal Event)

02:57 PM: Para Swimming - Ravi Budigina in Men's 100m Freestyle S13 Final (Medal Event)

03:00 PM: Para Badminton - Krishna Nagar / Sivarajan Solaimalai vs Dimas Tri Aji / Subhan (Indonesia) in Men's Doubles SH6 Group Stage

03:07 PM: Para Athletics - Ravanni Valasanaini in Women's 200m T11 Round 1 Heats

03:35 PM: Para Athletics - Ajeet Singh Yadav and Rinku Hooda in Men's Javelin Throw F46 Final (Medal Event)

03:55 PM: Para Athletics - Radha Venkatesh and Soumya in Women's 1500m T12/T13 Final (Medal Event)

04:03 PM: Para Athletics - Rakshita Raju and Ravanni Valasanaini in Women's 1500m T11 Final (Medal Event)

04:30 PM: Para Athletics - Pranav Desai in Men's 200m T64 Final (Medal Event)

04:37 PM: Para Athletics - Anjanaben Bumbadiya and Jayanti Behera in Women's 200m T47 Round 1 Heats

04:46 PM: Para Swimming - Kapil Kumar and Ajay Bhosale in Men's 100m Freestyle S10 Final (Medal Event)

TBD: Para Badminton - Pallavi Kaluvehalli / Alphia James vs Amnouy Wetwithan / Onanong Phraikeo (Thailand) in Women's Doubles WH1-WH2 Group B

TBD: Para Badminton - Mandeep Kaur / Shanthiya Vishwanathan vs Wong Lai Ming / Zhang Tsz Huen (Hong Kong, China) in Women's Doubles SL3-SU5 Group B

TBD: Para Badminton - Thulasimathi Murugesan / Manasi Joshi vs Yang Quixia / Xiao Zuxian (China) in Women's Doubles SL3-SU5 Group A

TBD: Para Judo - Kapil Parmar vs TBD in Men's J1 -70kg Quarterfinals

TBD: Para Judo - Kokila Kaushiklate vs TBD in Women's J2 -52kg Semifinals

TBD: Para Table Tennis - Shubham Wadhwa vs Feng Panfeng (China) in Men's Singles Class 3 Quarterfinal.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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