Khel Ratna, Arjuna Award, Dronacharya Award Winners 2024: Manu Bhaker, D Gukesh among recipients

The awardees will receive their awards from the President of India on January 17.

Ace shooter and two-time Olympic medallist Manu Bhaker, Chess World Champion D Gukesh, Indian men’s hockey team captain Harmanpreet Singh and para-athlete Praveen Kumar have been named the recipients of the prestigious Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award.

The Khel Ratna award is India’s highest sporting honour and recognises the exceptional performances and contributions to Indian sports.

The applications were invited online, and sportspersons/coaches/entities were permitted to self-apply through a dedicated Online Portal. A large number of applications were received for these awards this year, which were considered by the Selection Committee headed by Justice (Retd.) V. Ramasubramanian, Supreme Court of India and consisting members from eminent sportspersons, persons having experience in sports journalism and sports administrators.

Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports have announced the National Sports Awards 2024. The awardees will receive their awards from the President of India at a specially organized function at Rashtrapati Bhavan on 17th January, 2025 (Friday) at 1100 hours.

Based on the recommendations of the Committee and after due scrutiny, Government has decided to confer awards upon the following sportspersons, coaches, university and entity:

Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award 2024 winners

S. No.	Name of the Sportsperson	Discipline
1.	Shri Gukesh D	Chess
2.	Shri Harmanpreet Singh	Hockey
3.	Shri Praveen Kumar	Para-Athletics
4.	Ms. Manu Bhakar	Shooting

Arjuna Awards 2024 winners

S. No.	Name of the Sportsperson	Discipline
1	Ms. Jyothi Yarraji	Athletics
2	Ms. Annu Rani	Athletics
3	Ms. Nitu	Boxing
4	Ms. Saweety	Boxing
5	Ms. Vantika Agrawal	Chess
6	Ms. Salima Tete	Hockey
7	Shri Abhishek	Hockey
8	Shri Sanjay	Hockey
9	Shri Jarmanpreet Singh	Hockey
10	Shri Sukhjeet Singh	Hockey
11	Shri Rakesh Kumar	Para-Archery
12	Ms. Preeti Pal	Para-Athletics
13	Ms. Jeevanji Deepthi	Para-Athletics
14	Shri Ajeet Singh	Para-Athletics
15	Shri Sachin Sarjerao Khilari	Para-Athletics
16	Shri Dharambir	Para-Athletics
17	Shri Pranav Soorma	Para-Athletics
18	Shri H Hokato Sema	Para-Athletics
19	Ms. Simran	Para-Athletics
20	Shri Navdeep	Para-Athletics
21	Shri Nitesh Kumar	Para-Badminton
22	Ms. Thulasimathi Murugesan	Para-Badminton
23	Ms. Nithya Sre Sumathy Sivan	Para-Badminton
24	Ms. Manisha Ramadass	Para-Badminton
25	Shri Kapil Parmar	Para-Judo
26	Ms. Mona Agarwal	Para-Shooting
27	Ms. Rubina Francis	Para-Shooting
28	Shri Swapnil Suresh Kusale	Shooting
29	Shri Sarabjot Singh	Shooting
30	Shri Abhay Singh	Squash
31	Shri Sajan Prakash	Swimming
32	Shri Aman	Wrestling

Arjuna Awards (Lifetime) for outstanding performance 2024

S. No.	Name of the Sportsperson	Discipline
1	Shri Sucha Singh	Athletics
2	Shri Murlikant Rajaram Petkar	Para-Swimming

Dronacharya Award for outstanding coaches 2024

Regular Category

S. No.	Name of the Coach	Discipline
1	Shri Subhash Rana	Para-Shooting
2	Ms. Deepali Deshpande	Shooting
3	Shri Sandeep Sangwan	Hockey

Lifetime Category

S. No.	Name of the Coach	Discipline
1	Shri S Muralidharan	Badminton
2	Shri Armando Agnelo Colaco	Football

Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puraskar

S. No.	Name of the Entity
1	Physical Education Foundation of India

(vi)       Maulana Abul Kalam Azad (MAKA) Trophy 2024:

S. No.	Name of University
1	Chandigarh University	Overall winner University
2	Lovely Professional University, (PB)	1st runner up University
3	Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar	2nd runner up University

National Sports Awards are given every year to recognize and reward excellence in sports.

‘Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award’ is given for the spectacular and most outstanding performance in the field of sports by a sportsperson over the period of the previous four years.

‘Arjuna Award for outstanding performance in Sports and Games’ is given for good performance over a period of the previous four years and for showing qualities of leadership, sportsmanship and a sense of discipline.

Arjuna Award (Lifetime) is given to honour and motivate those sportspersons who have contributed to sports by their performance and continue to contribute to promotion of sports even after their retirement from active sporting career.

‘Dronacharya Award for outstanding coaches in Sports and Games’ is given to coaches for doing outstanding and meritorious work on a consistent basis and for enabling sportspersons to excel in International events.

The overall top performing university in Khelo India University Games is given the Maulana Abul Kalam Azad (MAKA) Trophy.

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