Eighty-seven year-old Balbir Singh (Sr.), the oldest living Olympic hockey gold medallist in the country, heads the list of 34 players to be honoured by Hockey India at a function here on June 24.
The players, members of the eight-time Olympic gold medal winning Indian teams, will receive Rs. two lakh each.
“It is our way of recalling the contributions of these legends to our sport and to the country,” said Hockey India Secretary-General Narinder Batra. “The London Games hockey competition will be first Olympics after the formation of Hockey India and we want to avail the opportunity to celebrate their gold-winning feats.”
Balbir Singh (Sr.) and Leslie Claudius were part of the teams that won gold medals in three successive Games from 1948. Keshav Dutt, G. Nandy Singh, Jaswant Singh, Raghbir Lal and Harpal Kaushik have been members of two gold-winning teams.
The invitees: Balbir Singh (Sr.), Keshav Dutt, Leslie Claudius, G. Nandy Singh, Jaswant Singh, Raghbir Lal, R. S. Bhola, Hardayal Singh, Haripal Kaushik, A.S Bakshi, Gurdev Singh, Charanjit Singh, Gurbux Singh, Harbinder Singh, Dharam Singh, Balbir Singh, Ali Sayeed, Darshan Singh, V. Bhaskaran, Bir Bahadur Chettri, Allan Schofield, S. Dung Dung, Rajinder Singh, Davinder Singh, Gurmail Singh, Ravinder Pal Singh, M.M. Somaya, M.K. Kaushik, Charanjit Kumar, Mervyn Fernandez, Amarjit Singh Rana, Mohammed Shahid, Zafar Iqbal and Surinder Singh Sodhi.
