# List of Arjuna Award recipients (1970–1979)

The Arjuna Award, officially known as the Arjuna Awards for Outstanding Performance in Sports and Games, is the sports honour of Republic of India. It is awarded annually by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports. Before the introduction of the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna in 1991–1992, the Arjuna award was the highest sporting honour of India. As of 2020, the award comprises "a bronze statuette of Arjuna, certificate, ceremonial dress, and a cash prize of ₹15 lakh (US$17,000)."

## Name

The award is named after Arjuna, a character from the Sanskrit epic Mahabharata of ancient India. He is one of the Pandavas, depicted as a skilled archer winning the hand of Draupadi in marriage and in the Kurukshetra War, Lord Krishna becomes his charioteer teaching him the sacred knowledge of Gita. In Hindu mythology, he has been seen as a symbol of hard work, dedication and concentration.

## History

Instituted in 1961 to honour the outstanding sportspersons of the country, the award over the years has undergone a number of expansions, reviews, and rationalizations. The award was expanded to include all the recognised disciplines in 1977, has introduced indigenous games and physically handicapped categories in 1995 and introduced a lifetime contribution category in 1995 leading to creation of a separate Dhyan Chand Award in 2002. The latest revision in 2018 stipulates that the award is given only to the disciplines included in the events like Olympic Games, Paralympic Games, Asian Games, Commonwealth Games, World Championship and World Cup along with Cricket, Indigenous Games, and Parasports. It also recommends giving only fifteen awards in a year, relaxing in case of excellent performance in major multi-sport events, team sports, across gender and giving away of at least one award to physically challenged category.
The nominations for the award are received from all government recognised National Sports Federations, the Indian Olympic Association, the Sports Authority of India (SAI), the Sports Promotion and Control Boards, the state and the union territory governments and the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, Arjuna, Dhyan Chand and Dronacharya awardees of the previous years. The recipients are selected by a committee constituted by the Ministry and are honoured for their "good performance in the field of sports over a period of four years" at international level and for having shown "qualities of leadership, sportsmanship and a sense of discipline".

## Recipients

A total of 136 awards were presented in the 1970s – thirteen in 1970, followed by twelve in 1971, fourteen in 1972, seventeen in 1973, fourteen in 1974, nineteen in 1975, ten in 1976, ten in 1977–1978, sixteen in 1978–1979 and eleven in 1979–1980. Individuals from twenty-eight different sports were awarded, which includes fourteen from athletics, thirteen from hockey, nine each from cricket and volleyball, eight from weightlifting, seven each from badminton, basketball and kho kho, six each from boxing and swimming, five each from ball badminton, football, table tennis and wrestling, four from golf, three each from billiards, kabaddi, shooting and yachting, two each from bodybuilding, cycling, equestrian and lawn tennis, and one each from gymnastics, polo, powerlifting, snooker and squash.

## List of recipients

Key :
| § | Indicates Para sports |
List of Arjuna award recipients, showing the year, sport, and gender :
| Year | Recipient | Sport | Gender |
| 1970 | S. J. Contractor | Yachting | Male |
| 1970 | Arun Kumar Dass | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1970 | Michael Ferreira | Billiards | Male |
| 1970 | Mohinder Singh Gill | Athletics | Male |
| 1970 | Gudalore Jagannath | Table Tennis | Male |
| 1970 | Sudesh Kumar | Wrestling | Male |
| 1970 | Gulam Abbas Moontasir | Basketball | Male |
| 1970 | Syed Nayeemuddin | Football | Male |
| 1970 | Sudhir B. Parab | Kho kho | Male |
| 1970 | J. Pitchayya | Ball Badminton | Male |
| 1970 | Dilip Sardesai | Cricket | Male |
| 1970 | Ajit Pal Singh | Hockey | Male |
| 1970 | Damayanti Tambay | Badminton | Female |
| 1971 | Achala Suberao Devra | Kho kho | Male |
| 1971 | Kaity Farookh Khodaiji | Table Tennis | Female |
| 1971 | Sobha Morthy | Badminton | Female |
| 1971 | Krishnamurthy Perumal | Hockey | Male |
| 1971 | Shyamlal Salwan | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1971 | Edward Sequeira | Athletics | Male |
| 1971 | Bhanwar Singh | Swimming | Male |
| 1971 | Bhim Singh | Shooting | Male |
| 1971 | C. P. Singh | Football | Male |
| 1971 | M. M. Singh | Basketball | Male |
| 1971 | Srinivasaraghavan Venkataraghavan | Cricket | Male |
| 1971 | Muniswamy Venu | Boxing | Male |
| 1972 | B. S. Chandrashekhar | Cricket | Male |
| 1972 | Vijay Singh Chauhan | Athletics | Male |
| 1972 | Udayan Chinubhai | Shooting | Male |
| 1972 | Anjani N. Desai | Golf | Female |
| 1972 | Michael Kindo | Hockey | Male |
| 1972 | Anil Kumar Mandal | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1972 | Satish Kumar Mohan | Billiards | Male |
| 1972 | Chandraya Narayanan | Boxing | Male |
| 1972 | Prem Nath | Wrestling | Male |
| 1972 | Prakash Padukone | Badminton | Male |
| 1972 | S. M. Shetty | Kabaddi | Male |
| 1972 | Balwant Singh | Volleyball | Male |
| 1972 | Eknath Solkar | Cricket | Male |
| 1972 | Jayamma Srinivasan | Ball Badminton | Female |
| 1973 | Niraj Ramkrishna Bajaj | Table Tennis | Male |
| 1973 | M. P. Ganesh | Hockey | Male |
| 1973 | Bhola Nath Guin | Kabaddi | Male |
| 1973 | Afsar Hussain | Yachting | Male |
| 1973 | A. Kareem | Ball Badminton | Male |
| 1973 | Surendra Kumar Kataria | Basketball | Male |
| 1973 | Dafadar Md. Khan | Equestrian | Male |
| 1973 | Dhanvir Khatau | Swimming | Male |
| 1973 | O. Mascarenhas | Hockey | Female |
| 1973 | B. H. Parikh | Kho kho | Female |
| 1973 | Magan Singh Rajvi | Football | Male |
| 1973 | G. Mulilini Reddy | Volleyball | Female |
| 1973 | Shyam Shroff | Billiards | Male |
| 1973 | Jagroop Singh | Wrestling | Male |
| 1973 | Mehtab Singh | Boxing | Male |
| 1973 | Sriram Singh | Athletics | Male |
| 1973 | Vikramjit Singh | Golf | Male |
| 1974 | Vijay Amritraj | Lawn Tennis | Male |
| 1974 | Manjari Bhargava | Swimming | Female |
| 1974 | Anjan Bhattacharjee | Cricket§ | Male |
| 1974 | Raman Ghosh | Badminton | Male |
| 1974 | Ajinder Kaur | Hockey | Female |
| 1974 | Ashok Kumar | Hockey | Male |
| 1974 | Anil Kumar Punj | Basketball | Male |
| 1974 | Shivnath Singh Rajput | Athletics | Male |
| 1974 | M. Syamsunder Rao | Volleyball | Male |
| 1974 | Avinash B. Sarang | Swimming | Male |
| 1974 | N. C. Sarolkar | Kho kho | Female |
| 1974 | Satpal Singh | Wrestling | Male |
| 1974 | S. Vellaiswamy | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1974 | T. C. Yohannan | Athletics | Male |
| 1975 | Devinder Ahuja | Badminton | Male |
| 1975 | V. Anusuya Bai | Athletics | Female |
| 1975 | Hari Chand | Athletics | Male |
| 1975 | Mantu Debnath | Gymnastics | Male |
| 1975 | Smita Desai | Swimming | Female |
| 1975 | K. C. Elamma | Volleyball | Female |
| 1975 | Sunil Gavaskar | Cricket | Male |
| 1975 | B. P. Govinda | Hockey | Male |
| 1975 | Shreerang J. Inamdar | Kho kho | Male |
| 1975 | L. A. Iqbal | Ball Badminton | Male |
| 1975 | S. K. Jamshed | Golf | Male |
| 1975 | Usha Vasant Nagarkar | Kho kho | Female |
| 1975 | M. S. Rana | Swimming | Male |
| 1975 | Rupa Saini | Hockey | Female |
| 1975 | Amar Singh | Cycling | Male |
| 1975 | Dalbir Singh | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1975 | Hanuman Singh | Basketball | Male |
| 1975 | Ranvir Singh | Volleyball | Male |
| 1975 | V. P. Singh | Polo | Male |
| 1976 | K. Balamuruganandam | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1976 | Bahadur Singh Chouhan | Athletics | Male |
| 1976 | A. Sam Christ Das | Ball Badminton | Male |
| 1976 | S. R. Dharwadkar | Kho kho | Male |
| 1976 | Jimmy George | Volleyball | Male |
| 1976 | Ami Ghia | Badminton | Female |
| 1976 | Shantha Rangaswamy | Cricket | Female |
| 1976 | Shailaja Salokhe | Table Tennis | Female |
| 1976 | H. S. Sodhi | Equestrian | Male |
| 1976 | Geeta Zutshi | Athletics | Female |
| 1977–1978 | Leslie Fernandez | Hockey | Female |
| 1977–1978 | Satish Kumar | Athletics§ | Male |
| 1977–1978 | A. Ramana Rao | Volleyball | Male |
| 1977–1978 | Sita Rawlley | Golf | Female |
| 1977–1978 | M. T. Selvan | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1977–1978 | Harcharan Singh | Hockey | Male |
| 1977–1978 | Kanwal Thakar Singh | Badminton | Female |
| 1977–1978 | Birender Singh Thapa | Boxing | Male |
| 1977–1978 | T. Vijayaraghava | Basketball | Male |
| 1977–1978 | Gundappa Viswanath | Cricket | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Suresh Babu | Athletics | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Shubrata Dutta | Powerlifting | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Gurdev Singh Gill | Football | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Angel Mary Joseph | Athletics | Female |
| 1978–1979 | Ekambaram Karunakaran | Weightlifting | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Shernaz Kermani | Paraplegics§ | Female |
| 1978–1979 | S. P. Khatavkar | Kabaddi | Female |
| 1978–1979 | Kutty Krishnan | Volleyball | Male |
| 1978–1979 | C. C. Machaiah | Boxing | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Minati Mahapatra | Cycling | Female |
| 1978–1979 | Nirupama Mankad | Lawn Tennis | Female |
| 1978–1979 | S. K. Mongia | Yachting | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Monotosh Roy | Bodybuilding | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Arvind Savur | Snooker | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Rajinder Singh | Wrestling | Male |
| 1978–1979 | Randhir Singh | Shooting | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Prasun Banerjee | Football | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Vasudevan Baskaran | Hockey | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Kapil Dev | Cricket | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Ramaswamy Gnanasekaran | Athletics | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Rajkumar Manchanda | Squash | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Suresh Kumar Mishra | Volleyball | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Rekha B. Mundhphan | Hockey | Female |
| 1979–1980 | Sunil Kumar Patra | Bodybuilding | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Om Prakash | Basketball | Male |
| 1979–1980 | Indu Puri | Table Tennis | Female |
| 1979–1980 | Bakshish Singh | Boxing | Male |

## Explanatory notes

* ↑ The cash prize was introduced in the year 1977–1978 as a scholarship of ₹200 (US$2.30) a month for 2 years. It was revised to one time cash prize of ₹5,000 (US$58) in 1986, to ₹20,000 (US$230) in 1987, to ₹50,000 (US$580) in 1993, to ₹1.5 lakh (US$1,700) in 1998, to ₹3 lakh (US$3,500) in 2001, to ₹5 lakh (US$5,800) in 2009, and to ₹15 lakh (US$17,000) in 2020.
* ↑ Diving
* ↑ Long-distance swimming
* ↑ Wheelchair, Javelin throw, Swimming & Table Tennis