Arjuna Award
The Arjuna Awards are given by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, government of India to recognize outstanding achievement in National sports. Instituted in 1961, the award carries a cash prize of ₹ 500,000, a bronze statue of Arjuna and a scroll.
Over the years the scope of the award has been expanded and a large number of sports persons who belonged to the pre-Arjuna Award era were also included in the list. Further, the number of disciplines for which the award is given was increased to include indigenous games and the physically handicapped category.
Selection process
The Government has recently revised the scheme for the Arjuna Award.As per the revised guidelines, to be eligible for the Award, a sportsperson should not only have had good performance consistently for the previous three years at the international level with excellence for the year for which the Award is recommended, but should also have shown qualities of leadership, sportsmanship and a sense of discipline.
From the year 2001, the award is given only in disciplines falling under the following categories:
- Olympic Games / Asian Games / Commonwealth Games / World Cup / World Championship Disciplines and Cricket
- Indigenous Games
- Sports for the Physically Challenged
List of recipients
Shri Rajat Chauhan
Archery
Lalita Babar
Athletics
Shri Sourav Kothari
Billiards & Snooker
Shiva Thapa
Boxing
Ajinkya Rahane
Cricket
Subrata Paul
Football
Rani
Hockey
Raghunath V.R.
Hockey
Gurpreet Singh
Shooting
Apurvi Chandela
Shooting
Soumyajit Ghosh
Table Tennis
Vinesh Phogat
Wrestling
Amit Kumar
Wrestling
Sandeep Singh Mann
Para-Athletics
Virender Singh
Wrestling (Deaf)