Shashruti is India’s first amputee swimmer to conquer Palk Strait

Nagpur: Shashruti Vinayak Nakade added yet another first to her illustrious achievements by becoming India's first amputee swimmer to conquer the Palk Strait — an open sea swimming challenge covering 35km from Sri Lanka's Talaimannar to Tamil Nadu's Dhanushkodi.
The 21-year-old from Nagpur took 11 hours and 5 minutes to complete the solo swimming challenge alongside para swimmer Ganesh Balaga of Andhra Pradesh. Both Shashruti and Ganesh were part of a group of Indian swimmers from Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, and West Bengal, who successfully completed the Palk Strait challenge in solo and relay teams, respectively. All the Indian swimmers participated in the challenge under the leadership of Arjuna Awardee and coach of the Indian para swimming team at the 2016 Rio Paralympic Games, Prasanta Karmakar.
Born and raised in Nagpur, Shashruti completed her schooling at St Xavier's and Kendriya Vidyalaya, and is currently in her final year at Hislop College. In 2022, she represented India at the Asian Para Games and last year narrowly missed qualification in the triathlon event for the Paralympic Games.