Padma Awards

The Padma awards are instituted by Government of India and I am reproducing below the recitation of these awards as found in the government website
Padma Awards, namely, Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri are
given for exceptional and distinguished service in any field including service
rendered by Government servants. The recommendations for Padma Awards are
received from the State Governments/Union Territory Administrations, Central
Ministries/Departments, Institutions of Excellence, etc. which are considered by
an Awards Committee. On the basis of the recommendations of the Awards
Committee, and after approval of the Home Minister, Prime Minister and
President, the Padma Awards are announced on the eve of the Republic
Day.

When I went through the list released yesterday I became curious to know about the nature of these awards as I found that all the awardees were more from Arts, Literature & science & Medicine.

What I found was very interesting. There are a total of 3381 awardees so far and the categories

  1. Literature & Education (673) and Arts (676) had each 20% each,
  2. Medicine (401), Science & Engg (394), Civil Service (393), Social Service (344) have 11% & above each
  3. Public Affairs (188), Sports (157), Trade & Industry (123) range from 5.6 - 3.6%
  4. The rest - defence services 1, Wildlife conservation - 2, Journalism -5, others 23 all form a minuscule less than 0.1%

So why is our country concentrating on Arts & literature more than others. The worst thing is there is no mention of " Agriculture" which is what is what our nation is supposed to be. I don't say we should not patronise arts & literature - but why give a prime importance to it. Why isn't Trade & Industry not getting a proper recognition while Agriculture is given a go by. Don't these are the main things on which all other things grow upon.

Coming to my home state Tamil nadu, the situation is no different, of the total 320 awards, the bulk of it goes to Arts 113 at 35%, followed by Literature & Education at 11% with 35 awardees. For industry it is just pathetic 4% with 13 awardees, while for wildlife conservation, journalism, defence services, & others category it is a 0 tally. However, in Medicine & Public Affairs, we seem to fair better than the National average clocking 15% (48), 8.75% (28) against national level at 11.9 (401) & 5.6% (188)

In Trade & Industry sector I did a further study and the topper are the following states

  1. Maharashtra - 44
  2. Delhi 16
  3. Tamil Nadu 13
  4. West Bengal 9
  5. UP 8
  6. Andra Pradesh 6
  7. Karnataka 5
  8. Gujarat 5
  9. Rajasthan 3
  10. Punjab 2
  11. Bihar, Goal, Haryana, J&K, Jharkand, MP, Orissa, - 1 each

I feel the above number are not truly reflecting the spirit of the different states at all.

So what is that I would like to request to the Government to consider

  1. institute a new category " Agriculture" and start recognizing
  2. Also include Infrastructure as one of the categories and recognize players in that field
  3. Trade & Industry to be given a better prominence
  4. Give more prominence to nature conservation rather than just wildlife conservation
  5. While recognizing NRI contributions to India, recognize the support of other Nationals for the Indian cause - This will include those that support India
  6. Same way recognize the contribution of PIOs contributions to those countries where they have migrated as they have made the " Brand India" famous for all of us
  7. Make guidelines in such a way that all states are sending recommendations for all categories ( I think this will be the practice)
  8. Have a maximum cap for each of the category, unless there is a exceptional performance

Let there be an inclusivity of all sector, this is my humble request. I dont know whether I have covered all those sectors that are required for the overall growth and well being, if not, please write about those that I have missed.

Jai Hind

Comments

Umasree said…
From the time, Aishwarya Rai and Akshay Kumar, got into this list, I ached in pain of the entirity of what you said here. True, may be they deserve. Thats a story apart. Why are people like Nandakine Amte in West, who strives for agriculture, Medha Patkar, of NBA not getting due recognistion.
Vikram Akula, who is pioneer in micro financing helping the poor farmers and women in rural India, is less known to common man. People like Mr Murugeshan of Rajathi group, Soundarajan of Suguna poultry, owners of MTR foods and Shakthi masala who are giving employment to challenged people around need to be recognised. There are people from various government sectors who work over decades and best among them also never get recognised. Unless and until the right people and right growth sectors get these awards and recognistion, they become nothing but meaningless.
January 27, 2009 at 1:00:00 AM PST
L. Venkata Subramaniam said…
Excellent statistics. I wrote an article on why so few Padma awardees in sciences and medicine. Then I found this article from you that is even more insightful. You have raised some very interesting points at the end of your post. I dont agree with the cap idea though.
January 27, 2009 at 5:33:00 AM PST
Sarada said…
Uma & Venkat
thanks for endorsing my outpouring. Like Uma said, from the time I read through the list yesterday, this topic was going on in my mind. So when I got up in the morning, after checking my mails, I started writing my feelings. But suddenly I felt I have to check the true status of how things are year after year or was this year just a exception. It took me solid 4 hours from 3.00 am to 7.00 to complete this work. But I felt I had spent the time producively ( the feel good factor of just bringing to lime light the unknown things).
Now is the task of how to carry this to the people who matter.
January 27, 2009 at 6:11:00 AM PST
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