Three Legendary Indian Cricketers Who Were Deprived of The Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award

The Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award is the biggest award given in the field of sports in India. Apart from cricket, it is given to the sports personnel competing in all the sports representing the nation. It started in the year 1992 and has been won by 38 people to date for an outstanding contribution in sports. In 2019, it was won by Bajrang Punia for wrestling and Deepa Malik for Para Athletics.

Talking about cricketers, it has been won by Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar in the year 1998. Legendary Indian captain, MS Dhoni won it in the year 2007 after having a successful stint as a skipper winning the maiden ICC T20 World Cup with team India. Current Indian skipper Virat Kohli won the award in 2018 after dominating world cricket with the bat.

However, there have been a few cricketers who rightly deserved the award but couldn’t get their hands on the prestigious award.

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Let’s take a look at the three legendary Indian cricketers who should have won the award but didn’t:

Anil Kumble:

Anil Kumble is a legend not only in India but in world cricket. He holds multiple records to his name and has been one of India’s finest players. He is the bowler with the maximum number of international wickets for India.

Having made his debut in the year 1990, Kumble went on to clinch a total of 619 wickets in Tests. He is third-highest wicket-taker in Test cricket and is only behind Muttiah Muralitharan and Shane Warne in the list. In ODIs, he has 337 wickets to his name.

He is only the second bowler in world cricket to clinch 10 wickets in an innings in a game. He did the unthinkable in a game against Pakistan in the year 1999. After having achieved so much, this surely feels an injustice when he could not have won the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award.

Sourav Ganguly:

Sourav Ganguly is another prolific name who has missed out on the Khel Ratna award. The ‘Dada’ of Indian cricket took charge as the captain in the year 2000. Under his captaincy, India won the famous Test match against the mighty Kangaroos at Kolkata. He made his Test debut in the year 1996 and smashed a brilliant hundred against England at Lord’s.

It was under his captaincy that India reached the final of the 2003 world cup. He is credited for establishing team India as a global power as it was under his captaincy that India started winning games away from home.

In 2004, his name was recommended for the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award but the then Olympic medalist shooter Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore won the prestigious award.

Rahul Dravid:

Rahul Dravid is considered to be one of India’s greatest batsmen ever. He was always overshadowed by Sachin Tendulkar in the Indian team, but when it comes to class, no one in World Cricket beats Rahul Dravid. ‘The Wall’ has the world record for facing the most number of deliveries in Test cricket.

He made his Test debut in the year 1996. Under his captaincy, the men in blue defeated England in a Test series away from home. He has a total of 10889 runs to his name in ODIs.

In Tests, he has scored a total of 13288 runs. His name was recommended twice for the award in the year 2006 and 2012. In 2006, Pankaj Advani won it while in 2012, it was won by Vijay Kumar and Yogeshwar Dutt.

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