New Delhi: Former Vice President of India M Venkaiah Naidu, veteran actor Vyjayantimala Bali, Sulabh International Founder late Bindeshwar Pathak, actor Konidela Chiranjeevi, and Padma Subrahmanyam have been conferred with Padma Vibhushan, the second highest civilian award of the country.
According to the Ministry of Home Affairs press note here on Thursday, M Fathima Beevi (Posthumous), Hormusji N Cama, Mithun Chakraborty, Sitaram Jindal, Young Liu, Ashwin Balachand Mehta, Shri Satyabrata Mookherjee (Posthumous), Ram Naik, Tejas Madhusudan Patel, Olanchery Rajagopal, Dattatray Ambadas Mayaloo alias Rajdutt, Togdan Rinpoche (Posthumous), Pyarelal Sharma, Chandreshwar Prasad Thakur, Usha Uthup, Vijaykanth (Posthumous), and Kundan Vyas have been conferred with the third highest civilian award, the Padma Bhushan.
The government has conferred Padma Shri on 110 people, including 34 unsung heroes.
Prominent awardees include tennis player Rohan Machanda Bopanna, squash player Joshna Chinappa, and India's first female elephant mahout, Parbati Baruah.
Among the Padma Awards, 30 of the awardees are women, two duo cases, eight persons from the category of foreigners, NRIs, PIOs, and OCIs, and nine posthumous awardees.
These awards are conferred the President of India at ceremonial functions that are held at Rashtrapati Bhawan, usually around March or April every year.