10 Odia achievers awarded

BHUBANESWAR: Ten Odia achievers, who brought glory to the State at both national and international levels, were presented with Acrux Showcase Odisha Awards-2012 here on Saturday. Interestingly, for many recipients it was the first award in the State. The likes of singer Sona Mohapatra and fashion designer Pritam Panda were delighted to be recognised by their own people. As Sona put it, “I am honoured to receive the award from a legend like Raghunath Panigrahi. We grew up hearing his song compositions like ‘Geeta Govinda’, ‘Lalita Labanga Lata’ and ‘Dashavatara’, and receiving the award from him is simply incredible.” Pritam echoed the same feeling. The award itself was designed in a way to represent Odisha as well as ‘Om’, a sacred syllable of Hindu religion. The Acrux Global Leader Award for Art and Culture was presented to internationally-acclaimed sand sculptor Sudarshan Patnaik by Ramesh Swain, managing director of Acrux Realcon Pvt. Limited. Rural Development Secretary SN Tripathi gave away the Global Sports Icon Award to cricketer Pragyan Ojha. His father received the award as Pragyan is busy playing IPL. The other awardees were CEO of Dhamra Port Company Limited Santosh Mohapatra, CEO of Aditya Birla Group’s Carbon Black Business Santrupt Misra, architect SK Das, Odissi dancer Aruna Mohanty, film-maker Nilamadhab Panda and Ollywood actress Anu Choudhury. Swain lauded the efforts of Satyabrat Ratho, managing director of Prelude Novel Ventures Private Limited, for supporting and helping in conceptualising the award. Ratho is also the editor of the ‘Showcase Odisha’ magazine that was launched at the event of which ‘The New Indian Express’ was a partner. The function was organised by Showcase Odisha. The awards have been instituted to acknowledge the success stories of Odisha.