designated position without being tagged. He decides to brave it and sets off in another mad scramble even as he feels tracers whizzing past him, too close for comfort. His head snaps back as a shot splatters paint all over his visor blinding him completely. The only thing he hears is his opponent’s jubilant voice screaming to the referee, “Hit, hit, hit.”

This is a scene from the 1st Open Paintball Championships 2010 which was recently organised near the Shillong View Point by XSV Adventures. Relatively new to the North East, the sport of paintball is rapidly gaining a faithful following, much to the delight of the battle seasoned founders of the organisation. Co – founder Aaron Russel Laloo says that the organisation is now 100 members strong. Originally founded by co – founders Johnathan Syiem and Aaron Russel Laloo, ESV Adventures offers aspirants the chance to get a feel of what it is actually like to be in a combat situation. Using specially made guns which use CO2 as a propellant for the gelatin globular ammunition, opposing teams of five aside duke it out inside the rectangular battle zone which is pitted with numerous markers which offer cover. The ammunition itself is bio – degradable and filled with coloured vegetable oil which leaves tell – tale smears of paint on anything they hit. A combatant is tagged or killed whenever he is hit by these globular projectiles. Safety is a big issue and hence, each combatant is issued a facemask and protective padding for the upper torso. Keeping this safety in mind, a player can be penalized for removing his facemask while he is still inside the battle zone. Though there are many variations on how the game can be played, the 1st Open Paintball Competition was run along the point based league system where teams score a point for each successful kill, two for capturing the opponents’ flag and a bonus point for every minute shaved off the 4 minute limit of each match. Victory comes either through the annahiliation of all five players on the opponents’ team or by capturing your opponents’ flag which is placed at their end of the field and safely returning it to your own side. Subsequently, points can be deducted from the team for removing the facemask before leaving the field, arguing with the referees, concealing a hit, continuing to shoot after being eliminated and losing contact with the starting point before the match starts.

The 1st Open Paintball Championships is the biggest event that has so far been organised by XSV Adventures. It had organised sporadic competitions every now and then before but the lack of a permanent venue had greatly hampered its ability to do so on a regular basis. Now that it has finally managed to obtain a permanent location, more competitions and tournaments seem to be in the pipeline. Mr. Laloo says that they are trying to branch out to the other Northeastern states and adds that people in Assam and Nagaland are showing a lot of interest. In fact, Nagaland is coming up with its own paintball association under the name ‘Point Blank’ later this year.

XSV Adventures has had some success in the past. They had, not too long ago emerged as winners of Division 4 at the 6th Open Paintball Competition which was held at Bangalore. Mr. Laloo who was part of that winning team smiles and says, “We didn’t know what we were doing since it was our first venture yet we won it.” Now, XSV Adventures is looking for serious paintballers with plans of sending at least two teams from the North East to this year’s National Competition.

With the completion of the newly acquired venue, XSV Adventures expects a rapid growth in the popularity of the sport within Shillong itself. In spite of the lack of a permanent venue, XSV Adventures has garnered quite a strong following in the past few months and now, with infrastructure firmly in place, XSV Adventures is ready to take on whatever problems arise with all guns blazing.