The man whose name adorns India’s highest sporting honour remains conspicuously absent from the country’s highest civilian award.
BY PC Bureau
New Delhi, August 29, 2026: Every August 29, India celebrates National Sports Day in honour of Major Dhyanchand, the hockey wizard whose stick helped put the country on the Olympic map. His name adorns the country’s highest sporting honour, the Major Dhyanchand Khel Ratna, and his contribution to Indian sport is virtually impossible to measure.
Yet there remains one conspicuous omission from his extraordinary roll of honours: the Bharat Ratna.
On the birth anniversary of the man who led India to three consecutive Olympic hockey gold medals, the question once again demands an answer: if Major Dhyan Chand is worthy of having the country’s highest sporting award named after him, why has India never bestowed its highest civilian honour on him?
Dhyanchand was born on August 29, 1905. He went on to become the defining figure of India’s golden era in hockey, helping the country win Olympic gold at Amsterdam in 1928, Los Angeles in 1932 and Berlin in 1936. His mastery of the ball earned him the immortal nickname “Hockey Wizard”. Government material describes him as one of India’s greatest sportspersons and credits him with helping redefine Indian sport on the global stage.
His birthday was designated National Sports Day in recognition of that legacy.
But the Bharat Ratna remains absent from his list of honours.
A demand that refuses to die
The demand to confer the Bharat Ratna on Dhyanchand is not new. It has been raised repeatedly by politicians, sportspersons, hockey administrators and fans.
In 2016, three-time Olympian and former India captain Dilip Tirkey led a campaign at Jantar Mantar demanding the Bharat Ratna for Dhyan Chand and also raised the issue in Parliament.
The argument was simple: if the country’s biggest sports award bears Dhyan Chand’s name and major sporting institutions and stadiums honour him, why should the country’s highest civilian honour not recognise him as well?
The campaign, however, did not produce the desired result.
The Sachin Tendulkar controversy
The most controversial episode came in 2013-14, when Dhyan Chand’s candidature for the Bharat Ratna was reportedly pushed by the Sports Ministry.
According to documents reported by India Today in 2014, then Sports Minister Jitendra Singh had recommended Dhyan Chand’s name for the honour. The Prime Minister’s Office acknowledged the recommendation.
But the candidature did not ultimately make it through.
The same report, based on an internal mail trail, said the UPA government made a last-minute change and chose cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar instead of Dhyan Chand. Tendulkar subsequently became the first sportsperson to receive the Bharat Ratna.
The issue created a lasting sense of grievance among many hockey followers, who believed that Dhyan Chand’s contribution to India was being overshadowed by the popularity of cricket.
It was not a question of Tendulkar’s achievements. His Bharat Ratna was historic and deserved. The controversy was over whether Dhyan Chand’s incomparable contribution had been adequately recognised before another sportsperson was given the country’s highest civilian honour.
The Khel Ratna gesture — but not the Bharat Ratna
In 2021, the Narendra Modi government took a major step towards recognising Dhyan Chand’s stature by renaming India’s highest sporting honour after him.
The Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award was renamed the Major Dhyanchand Khel Ratna Award.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he had received numerous requests from citizens to name the award after Dhyan Chand and that the decision respected those sentiments.
The government described the move as a tribute to one of India’s foremost sportspersons. Union Home Minister Amit Shah called Dhyanchand the country’s “greatest sportsperson” and said naming the nation’s highest sports honour after him was a true tribute.
But that decision also revived the Bharat Ratna debate.
For critics, renaming the Khel Ratna was welcome but insufficient. The argument was that the man whose name was considered worthy of India’s highest sporting honour deserved consideration for the country’s highest civilian award as well.
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A legend who never campaigned for himself
There is another element to Dhyan Chand’s story that makes the omission particularly striking.
He was not a celebrity in the modern sense. He did not have a public-relations machinery behind him. He belonged to an era when sport was played largely for the honour of the country rather than for endorsements, television contracts and social-media recognition.
His son, former India hockey star Ashok Kumar, has recalled his father’s humility and discipline. Dhyan Chand never sought publicity for himself.
Perhaps that is part of the reason his stature has had to be repeatedly rediscovered by successive generations.
The irony of National Sports Day
There is a powerful irony in the calendar.
Every year on August 29, India invokes Dhyanchand while celebrating its sporting achievements. The President presents national sports awards around this occasion. Athletes across disciplines speak about his legacy. The government celebrates his contribution. His name is attached to India’s highest sporting award.
And yet the Bharat Ratna remains missing.
The omission becomes even more striking when one considers what Dhyanchand represented.
He was not merely a great hockey player. He was one of the earliest Indians to demonstrate, on the world’s biggest sporting stage, that India could dominate a global competition.
At a time when India was still under British rule, his Olympic victories became a source of national pride. His performances helped create an Indian sporting identity long before the country became an independent sporting power.
More than a hockey question
The Bharat Ratna debate, therefore, is ultimately larger than hockey.
It is about how India remembers the people who built its sporting history.
Dhyan Chand died in 1979. More than four decades later, his name remains inseparable from Indian hockey. His birthday has become National Sports Day. His name has been given to the country’s highest sports award.
But the question remains unanswered: Is the man worthy of the nation’s highest sporting honour not also worthy of its highest civilian honour?
There is no shortage of national honours that carry Dhyanchand’s name. What remains absent is the one distinction that would put him in the company of India’s most revered national figures.
On his 121st birth anniversary, perhaps that is the unfinished chapter of Major Dhyanchand’s extraordinary story.
India has never forgotten the Hockey Wizard.
But it has still not given him the Bharat Ratna.
