Mulayam Singh Yadav, Ustad Zakir Hussain, SM Krishna awarded Padma Vibhushan
New Delhi, Jan 25: Former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav, former External Affairs minister in the UPA government S M Krishna and tabla maestro Zakir Hussain were among six luminaries selected for the country's second highest civilian honour Padma Vibhushan.
According to an official statement released on the eve of Republic Day, Yadav, medical professional Dilip Mahalanabis who returned from the US to serve in 1971-Bangladesh war refugee camps, and noted architect Balkrishna Doshi were selected for the Padma Vibhushan posthumously.
No one has been named for the Bharat Ratna, the country's highest civilian award.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted his congratulations to those who have been conferred the Padma Awards.
"India cherishes their rich and varied contributions to the nation and their efforts to enhance our growth trajectory," he said.
US based mathematician Srinivas Varadhan was also selected for the Padma Vibhushan award.
Noted industrialist Kumara Mangalam Birla, novelist S L Bhyrappa and author Sudha Murthy were among nine people awarded Padma Bhushan, the statement said.
Rakesh Jhunjhunwala (posthumous), actor Raveena Tandon, Manipur BJP president Thounaojam Chaoba Singh were among 91 luminaries awarded the Padma Shri award.
These Awards are conferred by the President at ceremonial functions which are held at the Rashtrapati Bhawan usually around March or April every year.
For 2023, the President has approved conferment of 106 Padma awards, including three duo cases (in a duo case, the award is counted as one).
Nineteen of the awardees are women and the list also includes two people from the category of Foreigners/NRI/PIO/OCI and seven posthumous awardees.
Padma awards, one of the highest civilian awards of the country, are conferred in
three categories, namely, Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri.
The awards are given in various disciplines or fields of activities - art, social work, public affairs, science and engineering, trade and industry, medicine, literature and education, sports, civil service, etc.
'Padma Vibhushan' is awarded for exceptional and distinguished service, 'Padma Bhushan' for distinguished service of high order and 'Padma Shri' for distinguished
service in any field.
The awards are announced on the occasion of Republic Day every year.
Here is the list of Padma awardees:
Padma Vibhushan
Balkrishna Doshi (Posthumous)
Zakir Hussain
S M Krishna
Dilip Mahalanabis (Posthumous)
Srinivas Varadhan
Mulayam Singh Yadav (Posthumous)
Padma Bhushan
S L Bhyrappa
Kumar Mangalam Birla
Deepak Dhar
Vani Jairam
Swami Chinna Jeeyar
Suman Kalyanpur
Kapil Kapoor
Sudha Murty
Kamlesh D Patel
Padma Shri
Dr. Sukama Acharya
Jodhaiyabai Baiga
Premjit Baria
Usha Barle
Munishwar Chanddawar
Hemant Chauhan
Bhanubhai Chitara
Hemoprova Chutia
Narendra Chandra Debbarma (Posthumous)
Subhadra Devi
Khadar Valli Dudekula
Hem Chandra Goswami
Pritikana Goswami
Radha Charan Gupta
Modadugu Vijay Gupta
Ahmed Hussain & Shri Mohd Hussain *(Duo)
Dilshad Hussain
Bhiku Ramji Idate
C I Issac
Rattan Singh Jaggi
Bikram Bahadur Jamatia
Ramkuiwangbe Jene
Rakesh Radheshyam Jhunjhunwala (Posthumous)
Ratan Chandra Kar
Mahipat Kavi
M M Keeravaani
Areez Khambatta (Posthumous)
Parshuram Komaji Khune
Ganesh Nagappa Krishnarajanagara
Maguni Charan Kuanr
Anand Kumar
Arvind Kumar
Domar Singh Kunvar
Risingbor Kurkalang
Hirabai Lobi
Moolchand Lodha
Rani Machaiah
Ajay Kumar Mandavi
Prabhakar Bhanudas Mande
Gajanan Jagannath Mane
Antaryami Mishra
Nadoja Pindipapanahalli Munivenkatappa
Prof. (Dr.) Mahendra Pal
Uma Shankar Pandey
Ramesh Parmar & Ms. Shanti Parmar *(Duo)
Dr. Nalini Parthasarathi
Hanumantha Rao Pasupuleti
Ramesh Patange
Krishna Patel
K Kalyanasundaram Pillai
V P Appukuttan Poduval
Kapil Dev Prasad
S R D Prasad
Shah Rasheed Ahmed Quadri
C V Raju
Bakshi Ram
Cheruvayal K Raman
Sujatha Ramdorai
Abbareddy Nageswara Rao
Pareshbhai Rathwa
B Ramakrishna Reddy
Mangala Kanti Roy
K C Runremsangi
Vadivel Gopal & Shri Masi Sadaiyan *(Duo)
Manoranjan Sahu
Patayat Sahu
Ritwik Sanyal
Kota Satchidananda Sastry
Sankurathri Chandra Sekhar
K Shanathoiba Sharma
Nekram Sharma
Gurcharan Singh
Laxman Singh
Mohan Singh
Thounaojam Chaoba Singh
Prakash Chandra Sood
Neihunuo Sorhie
Dr. Janum Singh Soy
Kushok Thiksey Nawang Chamba Stanzin
S Subbaraman
Moa Subong
Palam Kalyana Sundaram
Raveena Ravi Tandon
Vishwanath Prasad Tiwari
Dhaniram Toto
Tula Ram Upreti
Dr. Gopalsamy Veluchamy
Dr. Ishwar Chander Verma
Coomi Nariman Wadia
Karma Wangchu (Posthumous)
Ghulam Muhammad Zaz
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Actress sexual assault: Court says Prosecution 'miserably' failed to prove conspiracy against Dileep
Kochi (PTI): The prosecution had "miserably" failed to prove the conspiracy charge against Dileep in the sensational 2017 actress sexual assault case, a local court has observed while citing inconsistencies and lack of sufficient evidence against the Malayalam star.
The full judgement of Ernakulam District and Principal Sessions Court Judge Honey M Varghese was released late on Friday, and has revealed the judge also pointing out at unsustainable arguments put forth by the prosecution.
"The prosecution miserably failed to prove the conspiracy between accused No.1 (Pulsar Suni) and accused No.8 (Dileep) in executing the offence against the victim," the court held.
It examined in detail, the prosecution's allegation that Dileep had hired the prime accused to sexually assault the survivor and record visuals, including close-up footage of a gold ring she was wearing, to establish her identity.
On page 1130 of the judgment, under paragraph 703, the court framed the issue as whether the prosecution's contention that NS Sunil (Pulsar Suni) recorded visuals of the gold ring worn by the victim at the time of the occurrence, so as to clearly disclose her identity, was sustainable.
The prosecution contended Dileep and Suni had planned the recording so that the actress' identity would be unmistakable, with the video of the gold ring intended to convince Dileep that the visuals were genuine.
However, the court noted that this contention was not stated in the first charge sheet and was introduced only in the second one.
As part of this claim, a gold ring was seized after the victim produced it before the police.
The court observed that multiple statements of the victim were recorded from February 18, 2017, following the incident, and that she first raised allegations against Dileep only on June 3, 2017.
Even on that day, nothing was mentioned about filming of the ring as claimed by the prosecution, the court said.
The prosecution failed to explain why the victim did not disclose this fact at the earliest available opportunities.
It further noted that although the victim had viewed the sexual assault visuals twice, she did not mention any specific recording of the gold ring on those occasions, which remained unexplained.
The court also examined the approvers' statements.
One approver told the magistrate that Dileep had instructed Pulsar Suni to record the victim's wedding ring.
The court observed that no such wedding ring was available with her at that time.
During the trial, the approver changed his version, the court said.
The Special Public Prosecutor put a leading question to the approver on whether Dileep had instructed the recording of the ring, after which he deposed that the instruction was to record it to prove the victim's identity.
The court observed that the approver changed his account to corroborate the victim's evidence.
When the same question was put to another approver, he repeated the claim during the trial but admitted he had never stated this fact before the investigating officer.
The court noted that the second approver even went to the extent of claiming Dileep had instructed the execution of the crime as the victim's engagement was over.
This showed that the evidence of the second approver regarding the shooting of the ring was untrue, as her engagement had taken place after the crime.
The court further observed that the visuals themselves clearly revealed the victim's identity and that there was no need to capture images of the ring to establish identity.
In paragraph 887, the court examined the alleged motive behind the crime and noted that in the first charge sheet, the prosecution had claimed that accused persons 1 to 6 had kidnapped the victim with the common intention of capturing nude visuals to extort money by threatening to circulate them and there was no mention about Dileep's role in it.
The court also rejected the prosecution's claim that the accused had been planning the assault on Dileep's instructions since 2013, noting that the allegation was not supported by reliable evidence.
It similarly ruled out the claim that Suni attempted to sexually assault the victim in Goa in January 2017, stating that witness statements showed no such misconduct when he served as the driver of the vehicle used by the actress there.
The court also discussed various controversies that followed Dileep's arrest and the evidence relied upon by the prosecution, ultimately finding that the case had not been proved.
Pronouning its verdict on the sensational case on December 8, the court acquitted Dileep and three others.
Later, the court sentenced six accused, including the prime accused Suni, to 20 years' rigorous imprisonment.
The assault on the multilingual actress, after the accused allegedly forced their way into her car and held it under their control for two hours on February 17, 2017, had shocked Kerala.
Pulsar Suni sexually assaulted the actress and video recorded the act with the help of the other convicted persons in the moving car.
