Indian rowers provided the spark with a couple of bronze medals, while the unfancied women shooters added another bronze as India maintained their 15th position in the overall standings with a tally of 15 in the 17th Asian Games here today.
Armyman Swaran Singh Virk rowed his way through exhaustion to the third spot in single sculls before the men's squad added the eights title on yet another mixed day for the Indian contingent.
The double trap women's team of Shagun Chowdhary, Shreyasi Singh and Varsha Varman, brought some cheer for the largely off the mark shooters with their bronze medal on the sixth day of competitions.
India were assured of a silver in archery while the squash players were also assured of a bronze each in the men's and women's team events after making the semifinals.
But it was heartbreak for the Indian men's hockey team which went down to arch-rivals Pakistan 1-2 in a group B encounter. The defeat has put India's chances of progressing to the next round in jeopardy.
With the addition of three more to the tally today, India were placed 15th with one gold, a silver and 13 bronze medals. China continued to lead with 152 medals (77-41-34) followed by hosts South Korea (28-33-30) and Japan (27-35-31).
In badminton, star shuttlers Saina Nehwal and Parupalli Kashyap advanced to round of last and last 16 respectively but PV Sindhu bowed after losing in the preliminary stage.
Rowers were, however, the stars of today's proceedings for India.
As the rowing events ended at the ChungjuTangeum Lake International Rowing Centre, India's modest tally of medals stood at three bronze, the first having been won yesterday by Dushyant Chauhan in men's lightweight single sculls.
The performance was lower in both quality as well as quantity to the 2010 tally of 1 gold medal, 3 silver and 1 bronze.
Naik Subedar Swaran Singh must be complimented for putting up a brave effort. The timing he clocked here to win the bronze covering the 2000m distance (7 minutes, 10.65 seconds), was better than his performance at the London Olympic Games two years ago timing wise (7:29.66).
