President Ram Nath Kovind today conferred Padma awards on prominent personalities at a civil investiture ceremony in Rashtrapati Bhawan.
Folk Singer from Chhattisgarh Teejan Bai was honoured with Padma Vibhushan and Scientist Nambi Narayan was given the Padma Bhusan. Actor Manoj Bajpayee, Cricketer Gautam Gambhir, Basketball player Prashanti Singh, Footballer Sunil Chhetri, mountaineer Bachendri Pal were among the Padma Shri Awardees.
This year, 112 Padma awards, including four Padma Vibhushan, 14 Padma Bhushan and 94 Padma Shri, were announced on Republic Day. Twenty-one of the awardees are women. Notable are, Saalumarada Thimmakka who was conferred the Padma shri for Social Work. Aged 107, Thimmakka is an environmentalist from Karnataka and is known for planting banyan trees along a 4 km stretch of highway from her village Hulikal to Kudur. Kamala Pujari, a tribal woman from Koraput, who has the distinction of presently being a member of the Odisha Planning Board, was also conferred the Padma Shri for her commendable job in preserving indigenous paddy variety.
A part of the Padma Awards ceremony was earlier held last week on Monday in which former foreign secretary S Jaishankar, Akali Dal leader Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, film personalities Mohanlal and Prabhu Deva received the honour among others.
The awards are given in various disciplines — art, social work, public affairs, science and engineering, trade and industry, medicine, literature and education, sports, and civil service, among others.