The award season

How does your state/vocation stack up? (click for a larger version)

For an Indian citizen, the high point of his life is getting a national award on Republic day, straight from the hands of our Hon'ble President, the supreme commander of our nation. Although, arguably the Oscars and BAFTAs and Miss Universes etc. generate a tad more excitement among the masses.

This year too, the awards have gone to 133 fortunate individuals (134 if you count the Dhananjayan duo as two). The graphics above lists awards by state and category (source: NDTV, TOI), just to get a handle on the overall picture. As you can see, three states dominate the awards, bagging more than the 50% of the awards. Likewise, the categories Art, Literature and Medicine hog almost three fourths of all awards. If you add "Social Work", together they account for more than 80% of all awards. 

Unfortunately we are not in a position to provide other demographic info. except to say that the answer to your first question is 11, again this is an empirical observation. There is no easy way to answer the follow up questions.

In any case, here are some random observations:

No Bharat Ratna:

Last year there was a huge media chorus which wanted to award the Bharat Ratna to Sachin Tendulkar. This year, the media is deafeningly silent over the issue. So, you might want to ask why were they so worked up last year?

(i) They wanted to preempt certain people from getting the award

(ii) They really wanted Sachin Tendulkar to get the award

Of course we never raise questions  about the honest and honorable intentions of our media. Perhaps they were busy this year.

The "Arts" and the Ashes

The Arts happen to be the biggest catch all category which can mean anything from Aishwarya Rai to obscure earthen pot makers and everything in between. The media does not speculate whether Amar Singh of Samajwadi party (who also lives in a House named after the actress) had anything to do with it at all, so we have to.

Much as we hate to impose our views on who should get the awards, shouldn't the national awards try to compensate for lack of commercial success? Given that even a low estimate of the number of actresses more talented than Mrs. Rai Bachchan would run into hundreds, it is rather amusing that a regime that flagellates itself about the lack of opportunities etc. on a daily basis decided to give a 'Shree to the zillionaire actress. 

Ramachandra Guha:

We are not surprised, he debuts with a 'Bhushan.

Journalists:

This year there were two, Shekhar Gupta of Indian Express with a 'Bhushan representing secular English media, counterbalanced by Abhay Chhajlani or Nai Dunia (vernacular press). Last year's pattern was repeated. 

Sister Nirmala:

Sister Nirmala, who runs Mother Teresa's institute now, gets a 'Vibhushan. Quite obviously, new heads of that institute will always get a national award. Another reverend made it to the 'Shree list. Both awards are categorized under "Social Work". 

We believe it is time to create a new category for "Missionary Work", if not for anything else, just so that people doing social work under different arrangements should not get their hopes high.

Subrahmanyam Krishnaswamy

Time capsule. Indira Gandhi. Look it up on google.

Mysterious new category: Research on Himalayan Glaciers

Given that the other categories carry generic names such as Arts etc., this goes a little too much into details, doesn't it? There are categories for science, or if you prefer, even for Environment. So what prompted the Government to create a brand new category for what must be a highly specialized field of research? 

The award went to one Prof. Syed Iqbal Hasnain, formerly Vice Chancellor of Calicut University who appears to be a geologist. He was also head of Geology department of JNU. 

Dr. Hasnain has some curious views on Madrasa education. But that is really is the tip of the iceberg.

Recently there has been a surge of research about the dangers faced by Himalayan glaciers. For instance this report from Reuters. It is perhaps a coincidence that a certain community which otherwise shuns modern education shows great interest in this research.

To summarize, this years award season is a triumph of secularism.