New Delhi: In the Padma Awards declared a day before the 73rd Republic Day to be celebrated tomorrow, CEO of Google Sundar Pichai, Vaccine makers Serum Institute of India founder Cyrus Poonawala and Bharat Biotech's Chairman Krishna Ella and his wife have been awarded the Padma Bhushan Award. All of them have been endowed with this honour for their contribution in the field of Trade and Industry, said a statement here.
Among the four Padma Vibhushan Awards declared this year are Indian classical vocalist Prabha Atre, litterateur Radheshyam Khemka, late CDS General Bipin Rawat and late former CM of Uttar Pradesh Kalyan Singh. Except Atre, the rest three have been conferred with the Padma Vibhushan posthumously.
Some prominent names in the list of 17 Padma Bhushan awardees include opposition leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad from Jammu and Kashmir and Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee from West Bengal, along with the Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella among others. Sportspersons Pramod Bhagat and Olymopics gold medalist Neeraj Chopra are among the Padma Shri awardees, in addition to singer Sonu Nigam and musician KC Natarajan.
This year the President has approved conferment of 128 Padma Awards including 2 duo cases (in a duo case, the award is counted as one), 4 Padma Vibhushan, 17 Padma Bhushan and 107 Padma Shri Awards. 34 of the awardees are women and the list also includes 10 persons from the category of Foreigners/NRI/PIO/OCI and 13 Posthumous awardees.
Padma Awards, one of the highest civilian awards of the country, are conferred in three categories - Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri. The Awards are given in various disciplines of activities including art, social work, public affairs, science and engineering, trade and industry, medicine, literature and education, sports, civil service, etc.
‘Padma Vibhushan’ is awarded for exceptional and distinguished service; ‘Padma Bhushan’ for distinguished service of high order and ‘Padma Shri’ for distinguished service in any field. The awards are announced on the occasion of Republic Day every year and conferred by the President of India at ceremonial functions which are held at Rashtrapati Bhawan usually around March/ April every year.
The list of 4 Padma Vibhushan Awardees 2022 is as below:
- Prabha Atre (Art) - Maharashtra
- Shri Radheyshyam Khemka (Literature and Education) - Uttar Pradesh (Posthumous)
- General Bipin Rawat (Civil Service) - Uttarakhand (Posthumous)
- Kalyan Singh (Public Affairs) - Uttar Pradesh (Posthumous)
The complete list of 17 Padma Bhushan Awardees includes the following names:
- Ghulam Nabi Azad (Public Affairs) - Jammu and Kashmir
- Victor Banerjee (Art) - West Bengal
- Gurmeet Bawa (Art) - Punjab (Posthumous)
- Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee (Public Affairs) - West Bengal
- Natarajan Chandrasekaran (Trade and Industry) - Maharashtra
- Krishna Ella and Suchitra Ella (Trade and Industry) - Telangana
- Madhur Jaffery (Others-Culinary) - United States of America
- Devendra Jhajharia (Sports) - Rajasthan
- Rashid Khan (Art) - Uttar Pradesh
- Rajiv Mehrishi (Civil Service) - Rajasthan
- Satya Nadella (Trade and Industry) - United States of America
- Sundararajan Pichai (Trade and Industry) - United States of America
- Cyrus Poonawalla (Trade and Industry) - Maharashtra
- Sanjaya Rajaram (Science and Engineering) - Mexico (Posthumous)
- Pratibha Ray (Literature and Education) - Odisha
- Swami Sachidanand (Literature and Education) - Gujarat
- Vashishth Tripathi (Literature and Education) - Uttar Pradesh
Also read: Former Bengal CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee rejects Padma Bhushan
