the tournament was started in 1941 and is named after the president of the indian football association (west bengal's football association) at the time, sir manmatha nath roy chowdhary of santosh. the ifa were the ones who donated the santosh trophy. the runner-up trophy was also donated by an ex-ifa president, s.k. gupta. the trophy is known as the kamla gupta trophy. the third-place trophy, the sampangi cup, was donated by the karnataka state football association (then the mysore football association).