Sports Minister announces cash awards for South Asian Games medallists

The Indian Sports Ministry will award INR 1.5 lakh to each gold medal winner in the recently concluded South Asian Games (SAG) held in Nepal. The Games ended with India topping the medal-winning charts for the 13th time in a row, clinching 174 gold, 93 silver, and 45 bronze to take the tally up to a mammoth 312. The silver medallists will get INR 1 lakh and the bronze winners will be awarded INR 50,000 each.

Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju announced that all medal winners in the SAG will be awarded, just like the athletes who returned with medals from either the Commonwealth Games, Asian Games or the Olympics. "Going forward, we will have will have a structured cash reward policy for medallists in South Asian Games, as we have it for other multi-sporting events like the Olympics, Asian Games, and Commonwealth Games," he said, according to PTI.

"These Games should be a stepping stone for bigger things ahead. I congratulate all the medal winners and even those who participated. I wanted to give them more but due to financial constraints we could not this time around," Rijiju added.

Also read: India record highest-ever medal tally at South Asian Games

The Sports Minister was also asked about the increased cases of doping in India in 2019. According to reports by the National Anti Doping Agency, about 156 players have already tested positive this year - more than double the athletes in 2018. Players like Satnam Singh, boxers Sumit Sangwan and Neeraj Phogat, shooter Ravi Kumar along with wushu star Jai Prakash have all been suspended recently by the NADA.

He said, "Doping is a serious issue all around the world. The game should be clean and transparent and we are trying to increase awareness on doping. I don't want players to misguided due to a lack of information. We want to sensitise each of our athletes so that he or she doesn't fall into the trap of doping." Recently, the NADA got on board actor Suniel Shetty as their brand ambassador, in the hope that his vast reach will help prevent sports players from falling into the trap of the menace.