MUMBAI: Late Bollywood actor Rajesh Khanna, who passed away last year, has been honoured with the Padma Bhushan Award 2013. His wife, Bollywood actor Dimple Kapadia collected the award today from the President of India Pranab Mukherjee.
The Padma Bhushan is India’s third-highest civilian award after Bharat Ratna and Padma Vibhushan. Sharmila Tagore, Late Jaspal Bhatti and Rahul Dravid were also among the recipients of this honour.
Rajesh Khanna appeared in a total of 180 films from which 163 were feature films and the rest 17 were short films. His film ‘Anand’ (1971), the story of a cancer patient who believed in living life to the fullest, is still appreciated and watched by his fans. Dimple Kapadia was accompanied with their daughter Twinkle, who was extremely emotional at the event.
Savita Bhatti collected the award on behalf of her husband – comedian Jaspal Bhatti – who passed away last year in October.
On April 5, actresses Sharmila Tagore and Sridevi, and cricketer Rahul Dravid collected their awards. Today the Padma Bhushan awards were received by Adi Godrej (Industrialist) and Mary Kom (Boxer). S. H. Raza (Artist) received his Padma Vibhushan, which is the second-highest civilian award in India. Yogeshwar Dutt (Wrestler), Vijay Kumar (Shooter), Ramesh Sippy (Director) and Nana Patekar (Actor) received the Padma Shri.
The selection committee of this year included Bollywood actress Ratna Pathak Shah, scientist Anil Kakodkar and Union Home Secretary RK Singh, among many others.
The prestigious awards are bestowed to recognize the distinguished contribution in various spheres of activity.
