National Sports Awards 2025: India Honours Sporting Excellence

New Delhi, August 18, 2026 The Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports has announced the National Sports Awards 2025, recognising outstanding achievements and contributions made by athletes, coaches and organisations across different sporting disciplines. The awards highlight consistent excellence in competition while also acknowledging the efforts of those working to strengthen and promote sports in the country. The awardees were selected on the recommendations of a Selection Committee chaired by former Supreme Court Judge Justice (Retd.) Arun Kumar Mishra. The committee also included distinguished sportspersons, sports administrators and people with experience in sports journalism. A total of 17 sportspersons have been chosen for the Arjuna Award for outstanding performance in Sports and Games 2025, recognising consistent achievements over the past four years, along with leadership, sportsmanship and discipline. The Arjuna Award recipients include athletes Tejaswin Shankar, Muhammed Ajmal V and Priyanka Goswami; badminton players Treesa Jolly and Pullela Gayatri Gopichand; boxer Narender; chess players Vidit Santosh Gujarathi and Divya Jitendra Deshmukh; deaf shooter Dhanush Srikanth; hockey players Lalremsiami and Rajkumar Pal; kabaddi players Surjeet and Pooja; para-shooter Rudransh Khandelwal; para-athlete Ekta Bhyan; rower Arvind Singh; and shooter Akhil Sheoran. I Arumainayagam has received the Arjuna Award (Lifetime) for his outstanding contribution to football and his continued role in promoting sports after retirement. The Dronacharya Awards have also been announced in regular and lifetime categories. Parveer Singh has been selected for athletics, Chhote Lal Yadav for boxing and Neha Nandkumar Chavan for shooting in the regular category. Dharmendra Singh Yadav for boxing and Virender Kumar for wrestling have been chosen in the lifetime category. The Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puraskar 2025 has been awarded to the Army Paralympic Node, Pune, for its contribution to the promotion and development of sports. The Ministry said applications for the awards were invited through an online portal, with a large number of entries received and examined by the Selection Committee. The National Sports Awards, presented every year, continue to honour sporting excellence and recognise the contribution of athletes, coaches and organisations whose efforts help advance and develop sports across India.