MCQ – GK Questions

The Vigyan Ratna is the highest category of the Rashtriya Vigyan Puraskar, recognising a lifetime of achievement in science and technology. In 2025, it was awarded posthumously to Prof. Jayant Vishnu Narlikar — the astrophysicist, cosmologist, founder of IUCAA Pune, and science communicator who worked on the Steady State theory with Fred Hoyle. He died in 2025. This was only the second posthumous Vigyan Ratna in the award's history.

No cricketer featured in the 2025 National Sports Awards nominations for any category. The most recent cricketer to receive the Arjuna Award was pacer Mohammed Shami in 2023. India's women's team won the T20 World Cup and reached the ICC Women's World Cup final in the 2025 cycle, but no women's or men's cricketer was included in the panel's recommendations.

Gayatri Gopichand was nominated for the Arjuna Award as a player in the women's doubles badminton category, forming the top-ranked women's doubles pair in India alongside Treesa Jolly. Her father Pullela Gopichand is India's national badminton coach and former All England Open champion (2001).

Divya Deshmukh, a chess grandmaster born in 2005, won the FIDE Women's World Cup in 2025 — making her the first Indian to win that title. She was twenty years old at the time. She was nominated alongside Vidit Gujrathi, giving chess two nominees in the 2025 Arjuna list.

Six hockey players received the Khel Ratna before Hardik Singh's 2025 nomination: Dhanraj Pillay (1999-2000), Sardar Singh (2017), Rani Rampal (2020), P.R. Sreejesh and Manpreet Singh (both 2021, the year India won its first Olympic hockey medal since 1980), and Harmanpreet Singh (2024, Paris bronze). If Hardik Singh is confirmed, hockey will have produced 7 Khel Ratna recipients.

Aarti Pal is the national and Asian champion in yogasana — competitive yoga. Yogasana was formally recognised as a competitive sport by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports in 2020, but no yogasana athlete had been recommended for the Arjuna Award in the five years since. Pal's 2025 nomination was the first. Yogasana will feature as a demonstration sport at the 2026 Asian Games.

Hardik Singh was the only athlete nominated for the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna at the National Sports Awards 2025. The nominations were finalised on 24 December 2025. A two-time Olympic bronze medallist (Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024), he had also won the FIH Player of the Year award in 2023 and received the Arjuna Award in 2021.

The Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Trophy, which recognises the best-performing university in inter-university sports competitions, was shared jointly by Chandigarh University, Lovely Professional University, and Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU), Amritsar. The MAKA Trophy was instituted in 1956–57, making it the oldest award in the National Sports Awards system.

Thirty-two Arjuna Awards were given at the 17 January 2025 ceremony. Seventeen of these went to para-athletes — an unprecedented proportion — driven by India's historic 29-medal haul (7 gold, 9 silver, 13 bronze) at the Paris 2024 Paralympics, which was India's best-ever performance at the Paralympic Games.

The Khel Ratna was instituted in 1991–92 as the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award. On 6 August 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced it would be renamed to the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award, honouring the hockey legend born on 29 August 1905 — the date observed as National Sports Day.

Murlikant Petkar lost the use of his right arm in the 1965 Indo-Pakistan War. He then trained as a para-swimmer and won India's first-ever Paralympic gold medal at the 1972 Heidelberg Games in the 50m freestyle swimming event. At the 2025 ceremony (age 80), he received the Lifetime Arjuna Award and the room gave him a standing ovation. He was personally received by President Murmu.

Manu Bhaker won bronze in the Women's 10m Air Pistol individual event and a second bronze in the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team event alongside Sarabjot Singh at Paris 2024. No Indian athlete had previously won two medals in a single Olympics since India began participating as an independent nation in 1948.

The Khel Ratna for 2024 was presented on 17 January 2025 at Rashtrapati Bhavan. Manu Bhaker won two bronze medals at Paris 2024 Olympics (first Indian to win 2 medals in single Olympics as independent nation). D. Gukesh became the youngest World Chess Champion at 18 in December 2024. Harmanpreet Singh captained the hockey team to a Paris 2024 bronze. Praveen Kumar won the Paralympic High Jump gold (T64) in Paris 2024.

Gulzar received the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 2013 at the 61st National Film Awards and the Jnanpith Award in 2023 (jointly with Jagadguru Rambhadracharya). The Jnanpith is India's highest literary honour given by Bharatiya Jnanpith. No other person has received both India's highest cinema honour and India's highest literary honour.

V.K. Murthy — Varahalu Venkateshwara Murthy — received the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 2008 at the 56th National Film Awards. He was the first cinematographer to receive the award in its forty-year history. He is best known for his collaboration with director Guru Dutt, particularly the visual style of Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959) and Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam (1962).

Four sibling pairs have received the award: B.N. Reddy (1974) and B. Nagi Reddy (1986); Raj Kapoor (1987) and Shashi Kapoor (2014); Lata Mangeshkar (1989) and Asha Bhosle (2000); B.R. Chopra (1998) and Yash Chopra (2001). The Lata-Asha pair is the most frequently asked in exams because both are widely known to the general public.

Prithviraj Kapoor received the award posthumously in 1971 — the award was presented to his son Raj Kapoor at the 19th National Film Awards. Raj Kapoor himself then won the award sixteen years later in 1987. Vinod Khanna died in April 2017 and the award for that year was given to him posthumously. These are the only two posthumous awards in the prize's entire history.

Mohanlal was awarded the Dadasaheb Phalke Award for 2023, presented at the 71st National Film Awards ceremony on 23 September 2025. At 65 years of age at the time of presentation, he is the youngest person to have received the award. He is the second recipient primarily associated with Malayalam cinema, after Adoor Gopalakrishnan (2004).

The Dadasaheb Phalke Award was instituted in 1969 to mark the birth centenary of Dhundiraj Govind Phalke (born 30 April 1870). The first award was given to Devika Rani at the 17th National Film Awards. She was a pioneering actress and producer known as the first lady of Indian cinema who helped build Bombay Talkies in the 1930s.

From 1965 to 1981 (the first 17 awards), the Jnanpith was given for a specific outstanding work — similar to the Nobel Prize's association with a particular book or play. The rules were revised from the 18th award (1982) to recognise a writer's overall contribution to literature across their career, making it a true lifetime achievement award. This distinction appears in UPSC questions about the selection criteria and rule changes.