Prasun Banerjee
Award Name : Arjuna Award
Year of Award : 1979
Award for : Sports and Games
Location : Kolkata, Bengal, India
Prasun Banerjee is a retired international footballer and an Arjuna Award Winner (1979) from Kolkata, India.He was born on April 6, 1955 in Kolkata. He is a graduate of the University of Calcutta. Younger brother of the legendary Pradip Kumar Banerjee, Prasun had also captained the India national football team in international tournaments. Experts like Arun Ghosh, Pradip Kumar Banerjee consider the trio of Prasanta Banerjee, Prasun Banerjee and Parminder Singh as the best midfield of Indian Football team in modern era. He was included in the All Time Best-XI team of Mohun Bagan Club as a Central Defensive Midfielder. He was only the second Indian to play for Asian All-star XI. He also played two matches against Brazil for Asian All-star XI and played against Zico, Eder, Falcao, Socretes and others. He was included in the Limca book of record for representing India in 100 football matches. In 2013, he won the bypoll to the Howrah Sadar parliamentary constituency on a Trinamool Congress ticket thus becoming the first professional footballer to be a Member of Parliament, India (Lok Sabha). He won the seat defeating his adversary, Left Front's Sridip Bhattacharya, by more than 27,000 votes. He was re-elected to the 16th Lok Sabha in 2014.