Padma awards: Rajinikanth, Rohit Shetty shortlisted but didn't make the cut

NEW DELHI: Baba Ramdev and Mata Amritanandmayi, actor Rajinikanth, Bollywood directors Rajkumar Hirani and Rohit Shetty, industrialists GVK Reddy and Shiv Nadar and veteran vocalist Girija Devi were among the 1,897 names recommended for Padma awards this year but did not figure in the final list announced on January 25.
The list of persons for whom recommendations were received from one or more sources included film personality Gautam Navnitlal Adhikari, actor Sachin Pilgaonkar, music director Anu Malik, comic book creator Anant Pai, sarangi player Ustad Kamal Sabri, sarod player Pandit Tejendra Narayan Majumdar, herbal cosmetics entrepreneur Shahnaz Hussain and fashion designer Ritu Beri.

Letters endorsing the names of celebrity chef Sanjeev Kapoor, Hindi poet Ashok Vajpayi, Sanskrit poet Pandit Mithilaprasad Tripathi, singer Preeti Sagar, spiritual guru Acharya Sri Sudarshan and LGBT rights activist Ashok Row Kavi were also addressed to the Padma awards committee.

Among the sports personalities whose names were placed before the awards panel but did not show up in the final list put out on Republic Day-eve were snooker champion Pankaj Advani and athlete Anju Bobby George. The home ministry will shortly make public the list of all 1,897 names recommended for the prestigious awards -Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri - this year. As has been the practice since last year, the list of persons who recommended these names will also be uploaded on the home ministry website.

Though the list of Padma recommendations, accessed exclusively by TOI, confirms that Baba Ramdev was indeed recommended and considered by the Padma awards committee for the honour, senior home ministry officials remained tightlipped on whether he figured on the shortlist and got excluded after he declined the award.

The Padma Awards Committee painstakingly goes through the citations of each person recommended in a given year, before picking the final awardees. Awards are not conferred posthumously unless the person being considered has died within a year before the announcement of the list (one reason why Anant Pai may not have been chosen). Also, those facing criminal cases are usually rejected based on a verification of their antecedents.