Sports Certificates in DigiLocker: What Counts Now, and Why to Keep the Paper Too

On 29 February 2024 the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports told every national sports federation to issue merit and participation certificates through DigiLocker. The minister’s words, in the Sports Authority of India’s press release: “From June 1 this year, only certificates issued by the Federations through Digilocker shall be valid and no physical certificates issued will be recognised for Government and other benefits.” The federations’ affiliated units, the state and district bodies, were to follow from 1 January 2025.

Many families read that as “the paper certificate in the folder no longer counts”. What we found in October 2026 is less tidy. Issuing has largely moved to DigiLocker. The recruitment desk has not.

What has moved

The certificates a school-age athlete is most likely to hold are already there.

• Khelo India Games. Merit and participation certificates from the Khelo India Youth Games 2022 onward are on DigiLocker, “legally at par with Originals”, in the words of the Sports Authority of India’s release of 6 April 2023.
• National School Games. The School Games Federation of India says it uploaded 60,385 certificates from the 67th National School Games (2023–24) and 59,637 from the 68th (2024–25), and calls itself the first federation to issue all its certificates this way.
• Hockey. Hockey India has “fully integrated with DigiLocker”, covering about five years of national championship certificates, All India Radio reported in August 2025.

When the service was launched formally on 24 April 2025, representatives of 40 federations attended. Press reports of the launch say federations were given a year to digitise their records, and until the end of 2025 to put older certificates online down to district level. The Government’s own release does not state those deadlines. It does carry the reason athletes wanted the change, from Mirabai Chanu: “Many times sportspersons have to rush back home for certain documents – for government jobs, visa etc. – as we don’t carry them with us always.”

What has not moved yet

We read four sports-quota recruitment notices from 2025 and 2026 in full. None mentions DigiLocker.

Notice	What it asks for
Eastern Railway, 2025–26, published 3 September 2025	Scanned certificates uploaded with the application, and “the originals must be produced on the day of trials and document verification”
Western Railway, 2025–26, dated 29 July 2025	Original documents of sports achievement on the day of the trial, “mandatory”
South Eastern Railway, 2025–26, dated 31 December 2025	Original documents of sports achievements at the trial
Andhra Pradesh sports-quota teacher posts, 2025	Certificates from bodies recognised by the Ministry, the Sports Authority of India or the Sports Authority of Andhra Pradesh

Delhi University’s 2025 sports quota took up to three self-attested certificates uploaded with the application, as The Tribune reported. We found no court case in which a certificate was refused because it was not in DigiLocker.

So the answer is both. The DigiLocker copy is the one the Ministry has said counts, and nobody can call it unverified. The paper original is what a recruitment desk still asks to see.

How to find a certificate in DigiLocker

DigiLocker is the Government’s document wallet, an app and a website at digilocker.gov.in. An account is made with an Aadhaar number and the mobile number linked to it, and the documents it finds are the ones in that Aadhaar holder’s name.

For Khelo India Games certificates, the Khelo India guide (an archived copy of 9 March 2026; the file has since gone from the live site) gives three steps:

1. On kheloindia.gov.in, open the participation and merit certificate links and note the certificate’s unique number.
2. In the DigiLocker app, search for Sports Authority of India.
3. Enter the details and tap Get Document.

For school games certificates, the School Games Federation has a tutorial in English and in Hindi. For other sports, search DigiLocker for the federation’s name. If a certificate is not there, only the body that issued it can put it there; DigiLocker’s answers to common questions say the same of school and university records.

Why a fetch fails

Usually the names do not match. DigiLocker’s own answer is that “the name on the document must match the name on your Aadhaar”, and a document with a different name cannot be fetched.

The Khelo India guide lists three mismatches between the athlete’s entry on the National Sports Repository System (NSRS), where Khelo India athletes are registered, and their Aadhaar: the phone number, the date of birth and the name. Its advice is to keep the NSRS entry exactly as Aadhaar shows it. If a fetch still fails, write to kheloindiaevents@gmail.com or itdivisionhq-sai@gov.in with the NSRS ID and the details that differ.

This is cheaper to fix now than later. A name written surname-first on a certificate and surname-last on Aadhaar is one correction today and 10 after a few seasons.

For school games certificates, corrections and duplicates go through the state’s affiliated unit, never to the federation directly, under the School Games Federation’s notice of 6 August 2025. A correction needs the original certificate, a school document showing the right details and a ₹200 fee. A duplicate for a lost certificate also needs a police FIR and a notarised affidavit. These were the terms as read in October 2026; confirm the current fee with your state unit.

DigiLocker does not make a certificate count

A certificate in DigiLocker still has to come from the right body. The Eastern Railway notice above refuses “Certificates issued by the National Sports Federation during the period of their de-recognition”, takes only Hockey India’s certificates for hockey and does not consider Volleyball Federation of India certificates issued after 25 June 2020.

Check your sport’s entry on the Ministry’s recognised list, linked from the sports portals every family should know. Then check what the route you are aiming at counts: the Railway sports quota guide covers job notices, and the DU sports quota guide covers the certificate window and marks for admission.