London, Aug. 3: On October 20 last year, Vijay Kumar was slapped with a Rs 500 spot fine and had his Innova impounded by the Himachal Pradesh chief minister’s security for driving into a high-security area without a pass.

It took the simply dressed army subedar an hour to convince the guards that he had an invite from the CM, Prem Kumar Dhumal, to visit his residence. When he was stopped again at Dhumal’s gates, there were no star tantrums from the man with five Commonwealth Games gold medals.

State police bosses later got an earful from the chief minister when a search party he had sent out found the ace pistol shooter sitting patiently outside the main gate.

Today, after he won silver in the Olympic 25m rapid-fire pistol, few in India would fail to recognise Vijay and any gate anywhere in the country will open for the 27-year-old, who has a reputation for keeping a low profile despite his 13 international gold medals.

But immediately after his event, he seemed as unflappable as he had been during the shooting, and as he had been during his security ordeal in Shimla.

He showed little emotion and waved to none amid the ear-shattering applause. It was a couple of minutes before he began shaking hands with the other medallists and finally waved at the eager crowd of Indians gathered at the Royal Artillery Barracks.

“It really means a lot, it is my highest achievement to win a medal in an Olympic Games,” Vijay later told reporters. “I have lots of medals but that Olympic medal was missing. Now it is over.”

His success lifted Indian fans’ mood after a disappointing day. Saina Nehwal had lost in the badminton semi-finals and Calcutta shooter Joydeep Karmakar come close to securing the bronze in the men’s 50m rifle prone only to be denied by a whisker, after medal contender Gagan Narang failed to even make the final.

Rapid-fire pistol is considered one of the toughest events in shooting, where competitors have to take five shots within four seconds. Vijay started with a bang, hitting the target all five times in the first round, and was tied for gold till the third round before unfancied Cuban Leuris Pupo hit a purple patch.

The Indian kept finding the target four times in most of the rounds before missing thrice in the last after Pupo, world No. 21, had already sealed the gold. In the end, Pupo notched a record-equalling 34 points out of a possible 40 and Vijay ended with 30, ahead of Feng Ding of China.

What the army subedar — and son of a former subedar —from a Himachal village has also managed to do is break down a gate. Shooting, which has now fetched India four Olympic medals, is seen as an elitist sport and all the three previous medallists came from well-to-do backgrounds.

Abhinav Bindra, the Beijing 2008 gold medallist, belongs to an affluent family as does Narang, who gave India its first medal of these Games by shooting bronze three days ago. Rajyavardhan Rathore, silver winner in Athens 2004, is an army officer.

Vijay, who learnt to shoot after dropping out of school and joining the army at 16, is a non-commissioned officer from the Personnel Below Officer Rank.

He told The Telegraph over the phone: “This is the karishma (miracle) of the best wishes of my village and residents of my state Himachal Pradesh. I am incomplete without their love and best wishes.”

Pupo hailed his success as a victory for all of Cuba as he claimed the country’s first Olympic gold in the sport.

“This is the height of glory for the people of Cuba, for my family and for all those that have helped me get this medal,” he told reporters via a translator. “It means a lot to me and my family and my wife who is pregnant.”

Russian Alexei Klimov, who broke his own world record in qualifying, finished fourth.

“So sad, I feel like crying. Four years of hard work I wasted,” Klimov, who blamed the lighting in the indoor range, said.

Poonia in final

India’s Krishna Poonia qualified for the women’s discus throw final round, recovering after a foul throw to hurl the 1kg discus a distance of 63.54m. The final will be held on Saturday.