Anand Mahindra, Venugopal Dhoot, Rakesh Bharti Mittal missed out on Padma awards

NEW DELHI: Prominent industrialists such as Anand Mahindra, Venugopal Dhoot, Rakesh Bharti Mittal and Lachman Das Mittal are among those ignored by the government earlier this year for the Padma awards, according to details now made public by the Union home ministry.

The Chief Information Commissioner, in a letter to home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde on May 31 this year, had asked to make public all details about selection of Padma awardees on the ministry’s website.

Complying with the order, the home ministry has now made a disclosure of the 1,356 names for which it got nominations for the Padma awards given out on Republic Day earlier this year.

Rakesh Bharti Mittal, the vice-chairman and managing director of Bharti Enterprises; Venugopal Dhoot, the chairman and managing director of Videocon Industries; and Lachman Das Mittal, who set up India's one of the biggest tractor manufacturing companies; missed out on a Padma award for two years in a row as all three of them were on the list of nominees even in 2012.

The other prominent names in the list of nominees this year who were not chosen were Anand Mahindra, the chairman and managing director of Mahindra and Mahindra, Hero Cycles head OP Munjal and Oswal Woollen Mills chairman Jawahar Lal Oswal.

Film star Kamal Hassan and India’s top badminton player Saina Nehwal were not considered for an upgrade from Padam Shri award that they had got in 1990 and 2010, respectively.

Besides the cabinet secretary, home secretary, the secretary to the President and principal secretary to the prime minister, the other persons on the selection committee were famous nuclear scientist Anil Kokodkar, acclaimed Bharatanatyam dancer Leela Samson, chairman of Godrej and Boyce Ltd, Jamshyd N Godrej, the chairperson of National School of Drama Amal Allana and theatre and film actress Ratna Pathak Shah.