Static GK — Awards, Books, Sports, Persons

🟢 Lite — Quick Review (1h–1d)

Rapid summary for last-minute revision before your exam.

Bharat Ratna (India’s highest civilian award) recipients include C.V. Raman (1954), Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, Homi J. Bhabha, Lata Mangeshkar (2001), and the most recent recipient — Konkana Bose (2024). The Padma awards (Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan, Padma Shri) are announced each year on Republic Day (26 January). In 2024, Padma Vibhushan was awarded to S.M. Krishna, Dadha Phache, and others.

The Nobel Prize is awarded annually in six categories: Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature, Peace, and Economic Sciences (Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel). The Nobel Prize was instituted by Alfred Nobel’s will in 1895, with the first awards given in 1901. The Nobel Prize medal features an image of Alfred Nobel.

Major sports trophies include the Ranji Trophy (cricket), Dhyan Chand Award (hockey), Arjuna Award (multi-sport), Dronacharya Award (coaching), and Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna (now called Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna). India’s recent major sporting achievements include the 2022 ICC T20 World Cup (England beat Pakistan in the final), the 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup (Australia beat India in the final at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad).

⚡ Exam tip: SNAP GK frequently asks about the sport associated with a specific trophy, the field of a Nobel laureate, or the most recent award recipients. Memorise the Padma Vibhushan and Padma Bhushan recipients of the current and previous year. Also note that Nobel Prize ceremonies are held in Stockholm, Sweden (except Peace Prize, which is awarded in Oslo, Norway).

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🟡 Standard — Regular Study (2d–2mo)

Standard content for students with a few days to months.

Nobel Prize — Indian Winners and Connections

Indian Nobel Prize winners:

• Rabindranath Tagore (Literature, 1913) — first Asian to win the prize; wrote the Indian national anthem Jana Gana Mana
• C.V. Raman (Physics, 1930) — discovered Raman scattering (Raman Effect)
• Har Gobind Khorana (Physiology/Medicine, 1968) — shared with Robert Holley and Marshall Nirenberg for cracking the genetic code
• Mother Teresa (Peace, 1979) — Albanian-born, worked extensively in Kolkata
• Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (Physics, 1983) — astrophysicist known for the Chandrasekhar limit
• Amartya Sen (Economic Sciences, 1998) — for welfare economics and social choice theory; wrote “Development as Freedom”
• Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (Chemistry, 2009) — for studies of the ribosome’s structure; Indian-born British-American

Padma Awards — Civilian Honours

India’s civilian awards (in descending order of prestige):

1. Bharat Ratna — for exceptional service of the highest order
2. Padma Vibhushan — for exceptional and distinguished service
3. Padma Bhushan — for distinguished service of high order
4. Padma Shri — for distinguished service in any field

Notable 2024 Padma awardees included:

• Padma Vibhushan: S.M. Krishna (public affairs), Balakrishna (transport), Dhanasree (not confirmed — verify current year lists)
• Padma Bhushan recipients included personalities from art, literature, sports, public affairs

Major Sports Awards and Events

India’s major sports awards:

• Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna (formerly Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna) — highest sporting honour
• Arjuna Award — for outstanding sports performance
• Dronacharya Award — for excellence in coaching
• Dhyan Chand Award — for lifetime achievement in sports

International sporting events hosted by India:

• 1982 Asian Games (Delhi)
• 2010 Commonwealth Games (Delhi)
• 2011 Cricket World Cup (co-hosted with Sri Lanka and Bangladesh)
• 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup (India’s first FIFA tournament)
• 2022 ICC T20 World Cup (Australia/New Zealand, not India)
• 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup (India — Australia won)
• 2024 T20 World Cup (USA/West Indies — India won under Rohit Sharma)

Common traps in SNAP GK questions: Students confuse the Dhyan Chand Award with the Arjuna Award — Dhyan Chand is for lifetime achievement in sports, Arjuna is for specific outstanding performance. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded in Oslo, not Stockholm. Also note that Mother Teresa was Albanian by birth and Indian by citizenship — always use the full fact.

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🔴 Extended — Deep Study (3mo+)

Comprehensive coverage for students on a longer study timeline.

Nobel Prize — Detailed Categories and Laureates

Category	First Year	Notable Indian/Indian-origin Winners
Physics	1901	C.V. Raman (1930), S. Chandrasekhar (1983)
Chemistry	1901	V. Ramakrishnan (2009)
Physiology/Medicine	1901	H.G. Khorana (1968)
Literature	1901	Rabindranath Tagore (1913)
Peace	1901	Mother Teresa (1979)
Economic Sciences	1969	Amartya Sen (1998)

The Nobel Prize in Physics 2023 was awarded to Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz, and Anne L’Huillier for generating attosecond pulses of light. The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2023 was awarded to Moungi Bawendi, Louis Brus, and Alexei Ekimov for quantum dots. The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2023 went to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman for mRNA vaccine technology. In 2024, the Physics prize went to Geoffrey Hinton (neural networks), the Chemistry prize to David Baker, Demis Hassabis, and John Jumper (protein structure prediction via AlphaFold), and the Peace prize to Nihon Hidankyo (Japanese atomic bomb survivors’ organisation).

Major Literary Awards in India

India’s major literary awards include the Jnanpith Award (India’s highest literary honour, first awarded in 1961 to G. Sankara Kurup), Sahitya Akademi Award, and Padma Shri in literature. G. Sankara Kurup, Mahadevi Varma, and S. Radhakrishnan are early winners. Recent Jnanpith winners include Amitav Ghosh (fiction) though he has not won Jnanpith, which remains controversial for its silence on English-language writers. The Booker Prize has been won by Indian writers including Salman Rushdie (Midnight’s Children, 1981), Arundhati Roy (The God of Small Things, 1997), Kiran Desai (Hullabaloo in the Guava Tree, 2006), and Anand Giridharadas (winner, 2024 — verify). Margaret Atwood and Bernardine Evaristo won the 2019 Booker (joint award).

Olympic Games and India’s Performance

India’s Olympic medal history:

• First individual Olympic gold: Norman Pritchard (1900, Paris, 200m and 200m hurdles)
• First individual Olympic gold for India: KD Jadhav (1952 Helsinki, wrestling)
• First team gold: India won hockey gold in 1928 Amsterdam (first Olympic appearance)
• India’s hockey team won gold in 1948, 1952, 1956, 1964, and 1980
• Individual golds: Abhinav Bindra (2008 Beijing, 10m air rifle), Neeraj Chopra (2021 Tokyo, javelin), and the Indian cricket team has never won an Olympic medal
• 2020 Tokyo Olympics: India won 2 medals (Neeraj Chopra — gold, javelin; Mirabai Chanu — silver, weightlifting)
• 2024 Paris Olympics: India won 6 medals — Neeraj Chopra (silver, javelin), Manu Bhaker (bronze, shooting — two bronze in shooting), Aman Sehrawat (bronze, freestyle wrestling), and others

Cricket and Major Trophies

Major international cricket trophies:

• ICC World Cup: India won in 1983 (Kapil Dev’s team), 2007 (T20, MS Dhoni), 2011 (ODI, MS Dhoni). Australia has won the most (6 times).
• ICC T20 World Cup: India won in 2007 (T20, MS Dhoni) and 2024 (USA/West Indies, under Rohit Sharma). England won 2022.
• ICC Champions Trophy: India won in 2000-01 and 2013.
• Border-Gavaskar Trophy: India vs Australia Test series. India has dominated since 2013, winning four consecutive series (2013-14, 2017-18, 2020-21, 2022-23).
• The Ashes: England vs Australia Test cricket series, contested in England and Australia alternately.

Domestic cricket trophies: Ranji Trophy (first-class), Vijay Hazare Trophy (OD), Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (T20).

Major International Sports Events

• FIFA World Cup: 2022 held in Qatar (Argentina won, Messi), 2026 will be co-hosted by USA, Canada, Mexico
• Commonwealth Games: 2022 Birmingham (India finished 4th on medal table), 2026 will be in Victoria, Australia
• Asian Games: 2022 Hangzhou (India won record 107 medals), 2026 will be in Nagoya, Japan
• Summer Olympics: 2024 Paris (India won record 6 medals), 2028 Los Angeles

SNAP-specific question patterns: SNAP frequently asks about the year and category of Nobel Prizes, especially for recent winners. Questions pair authors with their books (Amartya Sen with “Development as Freedom,” Rabindranath Tagore with “Gitanjali”). Sports questions ask for the sport associated with a specific trophy — for example, the Dhyan Chand Award is for hockey, the Arjuna Award spans all sports. The most recent year’s Padma awards are almost always tested.