Captain of the Indian Test cricket team Virat Kohli will receive the Polly Umrigar Award from the Board of Control for Cricket in India, the sporting body declared on Thursday. The award is conferred on the best cricketer of the year in the corresponding season.

Kohli had a fruitful 2015 as a batsman, with several innings of note. He started off the year with a century against Australia in the Sydney Test, but his best innings was probably the 107 against arch-rivals Pakistan in a key World Cup clash that India went on to win.

It was as a captain though that Kohli was a revelation. He led the team to a series win in Sri Lanka after 22 long years and India's first win in an away series since 2011. Against the world's number one Test side, South Africa, India cantered to a 3-0 win, largely helped by Kohli's aggressive captaincy.

This is the second time Kohli has won the award, the first being in 2012. The previous winners of the award were Bhuvneshwar Kumar in 2014 and Ravichandran Ashwin in 2013.

Continuing his meteoric rise, Indian Test captain Virat Kohli was on Thursday named 'Cricketer of the Year', while Mithali Raj was picked for the top women's award in the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) annual honours to be given away on January 5 in Mumbai.

The 27-year-old batsman, who took over as captain in the middle of the tour of Australia after Mahendra Singh Dhoni's sudden retirement, delivered some good results under his leadership.

Under Kohli, the Indian team ended a 22-year wait for a series win on Sri Lankan soil before battering world No.1 South Africa to give them their first overseas loss in nine years.

The right-hander has done well with the bat too, scoring 640 runs in 15 Test innings that he played at an average of 42.67. In his 20 ODI outings this year, Kohli managed 623 runs at an average of 36.65.

Mithali, on the other hand, became the first Indian woman and second overall to complete 5,000 runs in ODI format this year. Mithali will be presented with the M A Chidambaram Trophy for the best women's cricketer.

In other awards, former wicketkeeper Syed Kirmani will be presented the Col. CK Nayudu Lifetime Achievement Award.

Karnataka State Cricket Association has been chosen the state association of the year for achieving the treble of winning the Ranji Trophy, Irani Cup and Vijay Hazare Trophy in the season.

Karnataka all-rounder Robin Uthappa has been picked for the Madhavrao Scindia Award for being the highest run-scorer in Ranji Trophy. Uthappa scored 912 runs in 11 matches, averaging 50.66.

The top wicket-taker's award is being shared this year by Karnataka's R Vinay Kumar and Mumbai's Shardul Thakur, both of whom scalped 48 in the previous season.