The late Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat, who died in a helicopter mishap, and former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and former Rajasthan Governor Kalyan Singh have been awarded posthumously the Padma Vibhushan, the second-highest civilian award.
Two others who have got this award are Ms Prabha Atre from Maharashtra in art and the late Radheyshyam Khemka of Uttar Pradesh in literature and education.
The third highest award -- the Padma Bhushan -- has been awarded to 17 personalities in different walks of life, including former Rajya Sabha Opposition leader Ghulam Nabi Azad of the Congress. (Azad has been a part of the churning within the party and has been calling for a more accountable leaadership).
Another 107 have been awarded the Padma Shri award. Among the Padma winners are 34 women, 13 posthumous and 10 foreigners or NRIs.
The other Padma Bhushan award winners are Ms Gurmeet Bawa (posthumous) from Punjab; Victor Banerjee from West Bengal; former West Bengal chief minister Buddhdeb Bhattacharjee of the CPI(M) and Rajiv Mehrishi, a Rajasthan cadre IAS officer who rose to become the Union home secretary and the CAG. Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was the Chief Minister of West Bengal from 2000 to 2011.
Cyrus Poonawalla, CEO of Serum Institute of India, which manufactures Covishield, has been also awarded the Padma Bhushan. Dr Krishna Ella and wife Suchitra Ella, founders of Bharat Biotech, the Hyderabad-based company that manufactures Covaxin, have been also honoured with the country’s third-highest civilian honour.
Also in the list are Sunder Pichai(49) and Satya Narayana Nadella, both from US; Pratibha Ray from Odisha; Swami Sachidanand from Gujarat; and Vashishth Tripathi from Uttar Pradesh (all three in literature and education category); and Sanjay Rajaram (posthumous) from Mexico.
The Padma Shri awardees include Prof. Najma Akhtar and J K Bajaj in literature and education from Delhi, Prahlad Agarwala from West Bengal, Sumit Anil in sports from Haryana, T Senko Ao from Nagaland, Ms Kamalini Asthana and Ms Nalini Asthana (duo) in Art from Uttar Pradesh and Subbanna Ayyappan from Karnataka.
The others from Maharashtra who have got the Padma Shri are: Ms Sulochana Chavan in art, Dr Himmatrao Bawaskar and Dr Vijykumar Vinayak Dongre in medicine.
The others in the Padma Shri list include Chandraprakash Dwivedi in Art from Rajasthan; Awadh Kishore Jadia (literature & education); Arjun Singh Dhurve from Madhya Pradesh; Faizal Ali Dar in sports from J&K; Neeraj Chopra in sports from Haryana; Jagjit Singh Dardi in trade and industry from Chandigarh; social worker Om Prakash Gandhi from Haryana; and Maljit Bhai Desai, Khalil Dhantejivi (posthmous) in literature and education, Savji Bhai Dholakia and Lata Desai in medicine -- all four from Gujarat.
