Renowned sculptor Raghunath Mohapatra and painter S Haider Raza were chosen for Padma Vibhushan as government came out with a list of 108 Padma awardees that included actress Sridevi, actors Nana Patekar and Malayalam star Madhu of Chemmeen fame and Olympians Mary Kom, Yogeshwar Dutt and Vijay Kumar.
In all four personalities were awarded Padma Vibhushan, 24 for Padma Bhushan and 80 Padma Shri. Of the awardees 24 are women, 11 belong to the category of foreigners, NRI, PIOs and posthumous.
Nobody was named for Bharat Ratna for this year too. The last awardee was late Bhimsen Joshi in 2008.
Satirist Jaspal Bhatti, who died in a road accident last year, film maker D Rama Naidu, noted South Indian playback singer S Janaki, Bharatnatyam dancer Saroja Vaidyanathan, missile scientist Dr A Sivathanu Pillai of BrahMos programme, Industrialist Adi Godrej and R Tyagarajan, former bureaucrat M K Bhan were among the 24 Padma Bhushan awardees. MORE