Indian ace shuttler Saina Nehwal has been awarded with the Sports Person of the Year award for 2008-09 in the ninth Petroleum Sports Promotion Board (PSPB) annual awards ceremony in Delhi on Wednesday.

Pankaj Advani, world billiard and snooker champion, shared this award with the aggressive cricketer Virender Sehwag for 2007-08. Romeo James (hockey) was given the Lifetime Achievement Award for 2008-09 while Monalisa Mehta (table tennis) bagged same honor for 2007-08.

Pankaj Advani (billiards and snooker), Gautam Gambhir (cricket), Anup Sridhar (badminton), Abhijeet Gupta (chess) were presented with the Elite Sports Person for the Year award for 2008-09.

The awards were given in glistering ceremony but most of the awardees were absent in the function due to different reasons. However, Advani, chess ace Abhijit Gupta, badminton players Shruti Kurien, Trupti Murgunde and India table tennis player Subhajit Saha ensured their presence in the function.