New Delhi: Author M T Vasudevan Nair, former Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar Sushil Kumar Modi and folk singer Sharda Sinha, are among the posthumous awardees in the list of the 139 Padma Award winners announced by the government here on Saturday on the eve of Republic Day.
According to the Ministry of Home Affairs, the honours list includes seven Padma Vibhushan, 19 Padma Bhushan and 113 Padma Shri winners.
The awards are among the highest civilian honours bestowed by the government of India.
As per the official release, 23 of the awardees are women, 10 persons belong to the category of foreigners, NRI, PIO and OCIs, and 13 are the posthumous awardees.
The Padma Vibhushan awardees include renowned gastroenterologist Duvvur Nageshwar Reddy, Justice (Retd.) Jagdish Singh Khehar, Kathak dancer Kumudini Rajnikant Lakhia, Lakshminarayana Subramaniam, Writer and Director M T Vasudevan Nair (Posthumous), Osamu Suzuki (Posthumous), and Sharda Sinha (Posthumous).
The Padma Bhushan awardees are A Surya Prakash, actor Anant Nag, Bibek Debroy (Posthumous), Jatin Goswami, Jose Chacko Periappuram, Kailash Nath Dikshit, former Lok Sabha Speaker Manohar Joshi (Posthumous), Nalli Kuppuswami Chetti, Nandamuri Balakrishna, P R Sreejesh, singer Pankaj Patel, Pankaj Udhas (Posthumous), Rambahadur Rai, Sadhvi Ritambhara, S Ajith Kumar, Shekhar Kapur, Shobana Chandrakumar, Sushil Kumar Modi (Posthumous) and Vinod Dham.
Among the 113 Padma Shri awardees are some unsung heroes. Some awardees include 102-year-old freedom fighter and social worker Libia Lobo Sardesai from Goa, 92-year-old Marathi author and wildlife researcher Maruti Bhujangrao Chitampalli, folk singer from Rajasthan Batool Begum, Karnataka's 96-year-old Bhimavva Doddabalappa Shillekyathara, Hugh and Colleen Gantzer -- The OG travel bloggers, singer Arijit Singh and Paralympic archer Harvinder Singh.
These awards are conferred by the President of India at ceremonial functions which are held at Rashtrapati Bhawan around March or April every year.