One Thousand Hockey Legs, an NGO which seeks to introduce the game of hockey to school kids in India, was awarded the Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puruskar by President Pranab Mukherjee. OTHL is a volunteer based organization, welcomes volunteers and coaches to contribute to hockey and children’s development through this platform.

Operating in five Indian cities,Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Puducherry and Kanpur. the NGO trains students in 90 schools and provides free hockey kits, coaching and other facilities for the kids to excel in the sport.

• Shri Pranab Mukherjee, Hon’ble President of India, presented the NGO with the prestigious Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puruskar 2016, on National Sports Day, where Rio gems PV Sindhu and Sakshi Malik were given away Khel Ratna.

• The NGO’s flagship project One Thousand hockey legs which seeks to introduce the game of hockey to at least 500 school kids every year, especially in schools where low profile and poor kids study came into limelight recently.

• The award was given for identifying and nurturing of young and budding talent. It is perhaps for the first time an NGO working in schools hockey promotion got the country’s top award.

• When India failed to qualify for Olympics in 2008, IIT Bombay alumnus and sports writer, Mr. K. Arumugam started the NGO in 2008 after giving up his government job. Over the period of 8 years, OTHL has done several pioneering works in the field of hockey.

• Recently, two of the OTHL boys got selected for the highly competitive National Hockey Academy. A total of 17 boys have joined STCs and few are studying in good private schools with scholarships and are part of their school’s hockey team. Many of the OTHL players have played in the National Championships. In the year 2015 alone, OTHL introduced 5 new tournaments.