India's Ravi Rongali finished fifth in the men's F40 shot put final, and Rakshita Raju exited in the opening round heats of the women's 1500m T11 race on the third day of athletics competitions at the Paris Paralympics on Sunday.
Rongali, who won a silver medal at the Asian Para Games last year, achieved a personal best throw of 10.63m in a highly competitive field.
In the men's F40 shot put final, world record holder Miguel Montero of Portugal claimed the gold with an 11.21m throw. Mongolia's Battulga Tsegmid secured silver with a distance of 11.09m, while reigning Asian Para Games champion Garrah Tnaiash from Iraq took the bronze with a throw of 11.03m.
Russia's Tokyo Paralympics gold medallist and reigning world para athletics champion Denis Gnezdilov, competing as Neutral Paralympic Athlete, finished fourth with a throw of 10.80m. The F40 class is designated for para athletes with short stature.
Earlier in the day, Rakshita, 23, ended last out of four runners in Heat 3, recording a time of 5:29.92. The result was insufficient as the top two runners from each of the three heats qualified for the final. China's Shanshan He led Rakshita's heat with a timing of 4:44.66, followed by Louzanne Coetzee of South Africa, who clocked a season-best timing of 4:45.25.
The T11 category pertains to athletes with visual impairment, which can range from complete vision loss to the ability to perceive light but not the shape of a hand at any distance. T11 athletes often run with guides.
On Friday, Preethi Pal won India's first athletics medal in a Paralympics track event by taking bronze in the women's T35 100m event with a personal best time of 14.21 seconds.
The 23-year-old Preethi, a farmer's daughter from Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh, had won bronze in the same event at the World Para Athletics Championships in May. The T35 classification is for athletes with coordination impairments such as hypertonia, ataxia and athetosis.
