As part of efforts to recognise the hard work of sports personalities and attract more youngsters to take to sporting events, the Puducherry government has evolved a scheme to provide cash awards to medal winners in international and national level competitions.
After taking inputs from State governments which are already running similar schemes, the government recently notified the ‘Grant of Cash Award to Medal Winners of Puducherry at the South Zonal, National and International Sports events organised by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports’, to provide cash award to achievers.
As per the scheme, gold, silver, and bronze medal winners are eligible for prize money. The scheme enables the government to provide cash award of up to ₹50 lakh for gold medallist in Olympics, ₹20 lakh for Asian/Commonwealth Games, ₹1.5 lakh for Senior National Championship and ₹20,000 for South Zone Championship. The teams getting gold medal in all these competitions would be eligible for cash assistance ranging from ₹10,000 to ₹10 lakh. Silver and bronze medal winners across all competition levels are also entitled for cash awards, said an official.
“Till the framing of guidelines, we didn’t have any scheme to provide assistance to medal winning sports persons in Puducherry. Now we have brought out the guidelines and the Lieutenant Governor issued an order notifying the scheme a few weeks ago. The scheme will certainly encourage more participation in sporting events,” he said.
The Directorate of Sports and Youth Affairs has been entrusted with the task to implement the scheme through the Sports Development Authority of Puducherry. There are around 200 applications pending with the Directorate for assistance. The applications are being scrutinised, he said.
“This year we will be disbursing cash prize to at least 100 medal winners. The process is on and it will be distributed very soon. Around ₹10 crore would be spent to honour medal winners, including those who participated in the events held in the past,” the official said.
Published – January 24, 2026 08:29 pm IST
