Stephanie "Stephie" D'Souza,
nee Sequeira (December 26, 1936 – September 11, 1998) was a sportsperson who represented
IndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
in athletics and
women's hockeyField Hockey, or Hockey, is a team sport in which a team of players attempts to score goals by hitting, pushing or flicking a ball into an opposing team's goal using sticks...
.
D'Souza was part of the Indian team that won the gold in the 4x100 m relay in the
1954 Asian GamesThe 1954 Asian Games was a mult-sport event celebrated in Manila, Philippines from May 1 to May 9, 1954. A total of 970 athletes from 19 Asian National Olympic Committees competed in 76 events from eight sports...
and a bronze in
1958The 3rd Asian Games were held from May 24 to June 1, 1958 in Tokyo, Japan. A total number of 1,820 athletes, coming from 16 countries, competed in thirteen events at this Asiad. Debuting sports were field hockey, table tennis, tennis, and volleyball. Tokyo would go on to host the 1964 Summer...
. She won a silver in the 200 m, creating an Asian record in the semifinal, and finished fourth in the 100 m in the latter competition. At one point, she held the national records in 100 m, 200 m, 400 m and 800 m.
She was eliminated in the first round of the 400 m in the
1964 Summer OlympicsThe 1964 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XVIII Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event held in Tokyo, Japan in 1964. Tokyo had been awarded with the organization of the 1940 Summer Olympics, but this honor was subsequently passed to Helsinki because of Japan's...
after finishing sixth in 58.0 seconds. She took part in the 100 yards and 220 yards sprints in the
1958 Commonwealth GamesThe 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games were held in Cardiff, capital of Wales from 18–26 July 1958.Thirty-five nations sent a total of 1,130 athletes and 228 officials to the Cardiff Games and 23 countries and dependencies won medals, including, for the first time, Singapore, Ghana, Kenya...
. D'Souza represented India in the first international women's hockey tournament in
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
in 1953 and captained the side in 1961.
Stephie D'Souza was the first woman to win the
Arjuna AwardThe Arjuna Awards were instituted in 1961 by the government of India to recognize outstanding achievement in National sports. The award carries a cash prize of 500,000, a bronze statuette of Arjuna and a scroll....
presented by the Government of India. She died in
Jamshedpur(Jharkhand) at the age of 61.