President Presents Sports and Adventure Awards 2025

President Droupadi Murmu presented the National Sports Awards 2025 and Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Awards 2024 at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi on 13 November 2026. The ceremony included the Dronacharya Awards 2025, Arjuna Awards 2025 and Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puruskar 2025.

Award recipients

Seventeen sportspersons received Arjuna Awards for their performance in sports and games in 2025. Recipients included decathlete Tejaswin Shankar, chess player Divya Deshmukh, hockey player Rajkumar Pal and kabaddi player Puja. Veteran footballer Isaiah Arumainayagam received the Arjuna Award (Lifetime). Five coaches received Dronacharya Awards: Parveer Singh, Chhote Lal Yadav and Neha Nandkumar Chavan in the regular category, and Dharmendra Singh Yadav and Virender Kumar in the Lifetime category. Mountaineer and former ITBP officer Shiv Prasad Chamoli received the Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award 2024 for Lifetime Achievement. The Army Paralympic Node, Pune, received the Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puruskar for its contribution to sports promotion and development.

Ceremony schedule

The awards ceremony took place more than a year later than its usual schedule, which is ordinarily on 29 August.

Important Facts for Exams

• Arjuna selection criteria: Arjuna Award candidates are assessed on four years of international-level performance, as well as leadership, sportsmanship and discipline.
• Dronacharya lifetime category: The Dronacharya Award’s lifetime category considers coaches’ record of producing outstanding sportspersons over at least 20 years.
• Dronacharya scoring: For Olympic, Asian and Commonwealth events, medals carry 80% of the assessment weight; the trainees’ event profile accounts for the remaining 20%.
• Adventure award verification: For the Tenzing Norgay awards, the Indian Mountaineering Foundation, National Institute of Water Sports and Aero Club of India verify land, water and air category achievements respectively.