15-yr-old wins 2 gold medals in National Deaf Swimming Championship

Vadodara: When he dives into swimming pool waters, he can't hear anything as Arush Lanjewar was born with partial deafness. But in a sport where the hearing impaired often suffer as they cannot put on their hearing machine, 15-year-old Arush, a resident of Vadodara, didn't just learn swimming but also won the national championship.
He won two gold medals in the 50-metre and 100-metre butterfly strokes, apart from two silver medals in the 200-metre individual medley and 200-metre freestyle category in the National Deaf Swimming Championships.
And, 15-year-old Arush was the only participant from Gujarat in the national tourney held at Thiruvananthapuram. "He was fond of water from a very young age, so we used to take him for swimming during summer vacations. He was always at ease in water. Three years ago, Arush decided to get into competitive swimming and started participating in tournaments," said Kadambini, mother of Arush.
"It was a bit tough initially as he would have to remove his earpiece while taking swimming classes. Taking instructions from the coach while in the pool was difficult, but Arush took the challenge and learnt competitive swimming," Kadambini told TOI.
Arush began his training in District Level Sports School (DLSS) launched by the Sports Authority of Gujarat (SAG), and he was trained by coach Vivek Singh Borliya. "This was Arush's first national championship, and he won four medals in it. Arush was always passionate about swimming, and he is a quick learner apart from being very attentive during the swimming classes," Singh, who worked hard to instruct and train Arush.
In 2023, Arush won a silver medal in the 400-metre individual medley category at the Bhopal CBSE zonal competition. In 2024, he won bronze medals in the 800-metre freestyle and 200-metre individual medley at the CBSE zonal competition in Indore. Later, he won bronze medals in the 50-metre freestyle and 200-metre individual medley at the SFI competition in Rajkot.