Who are the Dronacharya Award winners of the 80s?

The award is given to honour Indian coaches for outstanding guidance.

The Dronacharya Award is an award to honour coaches of different sports in India. The award is named after the character of Dronacharya from the Indian epic Mahabharata. The award was first presented in 1984 and there have been 129 winners of the award to date. The Dronacharya award is presented by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports.

The award is to honour those coaches who enable sportspersons to excel in international events over a period of four years. A separate lifetime achievement award is also presented to those coaches who have helped in producing exceptional sportspersons over a period of 20 years.

The award consists of a bronze statuette of Dronacharya, a certificate, a ceremonial dress and a cash prize of 15 lakh rupees. A 10-man committee elects the winners every year. Here is a look at the recipients of the Dronacharya award in the 1980s.

Balachandra Bhaskar Bhagwat (1985)

Balachandra Bhaskar Bhagwat was one of the first recipients of the award. He was awarded in 1985 for his contributions to the sport of wrestling.

Om Prakash Bhardwaj (1985)

Om Prakash Bhardwaj received the award for Boxing. Bhardwaj was the national coach for Boxing from 1968 to 1989 during which period Indian boxers saw success in multiple international boxing events including the Asian Games.

Othayothu Madhavan Nambiar (1985)

O.M. Nambiar received the award for Athletics. He was the coach of legendary Indian athlete P.T. Usha. Nambiar also won the Padma Shri in 2021.

Desh Azad (1986)

Desh Azad received the award for his contributions to the field of Cricket. Azad in his playing career played first-class cricket for Haryana. However, he is more famous as a coach, having coached the likes of Kapil Dev, Chetan Sharma and Yograj Singh.

Raghunandan Gokhale (1986)

Raghunandan Gokhale received the Dronacharya award for Chess at the young age of 32. Gokhale won the award for his work with Anupama Gokhale, one of the best chess players in the country at that time. Raghunandan Gokhale has since then gone on to coach many brilliant chess players, most notably Ankit Rajpara and Bhakti Kulkarni.

Guru Hanuman (1987)

Vijay Pal Yadav popularly known as Guru Hanuman is a legend of Indian wrestling. He revolutionized the Indian wrestling scene, fusing the Indian traditional wrestling style with the International scenario. Many players went on to win medals in Commonwealth Games and Asian games under his guidance.  It is believed that he went on to coach all of India’s international wrestlers. Eight of the players he coached went on to win the Arjuna Award.

Gurcharan Singh (1987)

Gurcharan Singh received the Dronachary award in 1987, becoming the second coach to win this award for Cricket. Singh was the coach of the Indian National cricket team from 1986 to 1987. He then went on to become the director of the Pace Bowling Academy started by the BCCI. Singh has coached more than 100 first-class cricketers and 12 international cricketers most notably Kirti Azad, Ajay Jadeja and Murali Kartik.

The Dronacharya Award was not presented in the years 1988 and 1989.