Vijay Amritraj

Vijay Amritraj, the Chennai-born tennis player who reached the quarter-finals at Wimbledon and the US Open and later became a broadcaster, has spent much of his post-playing life on humanitarian advocacy and grant-making for causes in India.

His public advocacy began while he was still competing. He addressed the United Nations in May 1988 on the twenty-fifth anniversary of its Special Committee against Apartheid, and in November of that year received the Pierre de Coubertin award in Paris. On 9 February 2001 the Secretary-General Kofi Annan appointed him a United Nations Messenger of Peace, a role in which he campaigned on drug abuse and on HIV and AIDS and raised funds for the response to the epidemic.

In 2006 he founded the Vijay Amritraj Foundation, which describes its purpose as bringing help to people in India affected by disease, tragedy and circumstance. Rather than run its own services, the foundation makes grants to Indian charities working with groups that struggle to attract funding. Its beneficiaries have included Prajwala, which rescues women and children trafficked into prostitution; Mitra Jyothi, which trains blind women; the Naz Foundation's paediatric HIV work; the Parikrma Humanity Foundation's schools for children from Bengaluru's slums; St Vincent's Home for AIDS patients; Shantipuram, which shelters people with mental illness; the Rajan Eye Care Hospital; and Sri Ramachandra Medical College, which performs surgery for villagers who could not otherwise afford it.

He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1983 and the Padma Bhushan in 2026, and was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2024.[1][2][3]