Who Was Konica Layak? National-Level Shooter Died By Suicide

Konica Layak, a 26-year-old shooting champion from Jharkhand allegedly died by suicide on Wednesday. She was undergoing training at Joydeep Karmarkar Shooting Academy at Kolkata.

Her death has come as a shock to National Rifle Association, her coach, family members and friends.

Who Was Konica Layak?

• Konica Layak was a national-level shooting player who belonged to Dhanbad in the state of Jharkhand.
• She was residing in Kolkata where she was enrolled in Joydeep Karmarkar Shooting Academy for her training. Joydeep Karmarkar, her coach, has represented India at Olympics in shooting, been a World Cup Medalist and an Arjuna Awardee(2012).

Suggested Reading: Sporting Community In Shock After Shooter Konica Layak Ends Life

• Konica won the 10-metre air rifle state championship of Jharkhand in 2020. In a total tally, she won four medals at the regional level championship.
• In 2021, Konica was selected to an international shooting competition, but she was not able to participate in it as she did not have her own rifle to practice. Besides, she had to rent rifle from her friends or the coach for participating in a tournaments.
• Her story reached the actor and social worker, Sonu Sood through a user on Twitter. Sood, then gifted her with a 2.5 lakh German rifle so that she could proceed with the participation using her own rifle. The actor called her death a "huge loss" on Twitter.

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• Konica died by suicide on Wednesday, December 15, 2021. She was found hanging at her hostel in Bally of Howrah district in Kolkata. Her parents have reportedly said that they were called  by the police on the pretext of her bad health.
• Her coach and ace shooting champion Joydeep Karmarkar said in one of the interviews, that she was missing her sessions a lot since last 10 days due to some reasons or the other.
• In November 2021, Konica Layak was disqualified for target manipulation at GV Malvankar championships.

Similar Incidents:

This has been a fourth instance of shooter dying by suicide in India in 2o21. Few days back, a young shooting champion from Faridkot of Punjab, Khush Seerat Kaur died due to suicide after not been able to perform well at the National championship conducted recently. Read here.