Padma Vibhushan for artist S H Raza, three others

Adi Godrej, late Rajesh Khanna, Sharmila Tagore get Padma Bhushan, Sridevi, Nana Patekar, Mary Kom get Padma Shri

Ramamurthy Thyagarajan, the man behind the Tamilnadu-based Sriram chit fund group and Adi Godrej, who heads the Godrej group, were today awarded with a Padma Bhushan. The Padma Shri went to health and fitness industry entrepreneur Vandana Luthra, Dalit entrepreneurs Kalpana Saroj and Milind Kamble, motive force in the south Indian sugar industry Rajshree Pathy, and Hemendra Prasad Barooah, a pioneer in the Assam-based tea industry and industrial packaging business.

A large number of the civilian awards went to persons from the ‘art’ category, especially from Bollywood, including Rajesh Khanna, Sharmila Tagore and Ramanaidu Daggubati (Padma Bhushan). Sridevi, Nana Patekar, R Nageswara Rao, Madhu and Ramesh Sippy (Padma Shri) were among other Bollywood personalities to get the awards.

No award was given from the journalist category though Pablo Bartholomew, whose pictures from the Bhopal gas leak continue to be the most graphic reminders of the disaster, was given a Padma Shri.

Manju Bharat Ram got a Padma Shri posthumously for social work. Gayatri Spivak (Padma Bhushan) well known philosophy and history scholar and Anvita Abbi (Padma Shri) were also conferred honours. Mary Kom and Vijay Kumar among others were awarded honours from the sports category.

The announcement of the civilian honours list was delayed this year, because authoratative sources said there was some debate about recipients of the Padma Vibhushan, the second highest civilian honour. Ultimately, it went to two persons in the ‘art’ category – artist SH Raza and Raghunath Mohapatra - and to two scientists, Prof Yashpal and Prof Roddam Narasimha.

Last year, a Right to Information query had revealed that one of the recipients of the Padma awards had a number of criminal cases against him.