The Sports Ministry has doubled the cash awards for gold medal winners to 20 lakhs rupees for the Commonwealth Games and Asian Games to encourage sportspersons to come up with an improved performance in the upcoming mega events. The announcement to increase the cash incentives was made by the Sports Minister M S Gill after the annual conference of State Sports Ministers in New Delhi. The Sports Ministry said in a release that the cash award for silver medalist has been raised to 10 lakh rupees and that of bronze medalist to and 6 lakhs rupees.