Nishad Kumar (born 3 October 1999) is an Indian paralympian and high jumper. He made his maiden Paralympic Games appearance in 2020 Tokyo representing India and went onto claim silver medal in the men’s high jump T47 category with a new Asian record of 2.06m.
He was born in Badaun in Himachal Pradesh’s Una district. With his father owning less than an acre of farmland in their village, Nishad grew up seeing his father doing masonry work to support the family. While helping his mother, he met with a tragic accident at the age of eight, Nishad lost his right hand in a fodder-cutting machine. He was taken to a hospital in Punjab, but the hand had to be amputated.
While a young Nishad would win a high jump silver medal in the sub-junior category at the 2013 National School Games in Patiala, only in 2017 he started competing in the para category. The athlete came to Panchkula to train under Naseem Ahmad, coach of Olympic javelin throw champion Neeraj Chopra, and Vikram Chaudhary. He would win the silver medal in high jump with an effort of 1.83m at the National Para Athletics Championship at Panchkula the same year.
In November 2019, he claimed bronze medal in the men’s T47 category at the 2019 World Para Athletics Championships and as a result he qualified to compete at the 2020 Summer Paralympics. He claimed gold medal in T46 category at the 2021 World Para Athletics Grand Prix which was held in Dubai.
