India, July 23 -- Lawn bowls rarely gets the attention that athletics, boxing or wrestling do in India. Yet it has quietly become one of the country's most dependable medal sources at the Commonwealth Games. At Birmingham 2022, India's bowlers delivered a historic double: the women's fours team of Lovely Choubey, Pinki, Nayanmoni Saikia and Rupa Rani Tirkey won gold, beating South Africa 17-10 in the final, while the men's fours side took silver. Those were India's first-ever Commonwealth Games medals in the sport. Four years on, as the Games return in a smaller format in Glasgow, lawn bowls is again being spoken of as one of India's better bets for a podium finish.

Lawn bowls involves rolling asymmetric balls called "bowls" as close as ...