G. Gourakishore Sharma selected for Tagore Akademi Ratna

NEW DELHI, December 16 (MIC): Manipuri martial arts Guru G. Gourakishore Sharma was among 50 prominent performing artistes of the  country selected for the Tagore Akademi Ratna which carried the purse money Rs. 3 lakhs.

Karam Chaoba Singh in Sankritana (Ariba Pala), Devjani Chaliha in Manipuri dance and Abungbam Kabui in Tribal dance of Manipur were among 50 eminent artistes selected for the Tagore Akademi Puraskar which carried the purse money of Rs 1 lakh.

As a part of the ongoing commemoration of the 150th Birth Anniversary of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore, the Sangeet Natak Akademi decided to institute a one-time honour of Tagore Samman to be awarded to 100 personalities of the age of 75 years and above who had made significant contribution in the field of performing arts.  The proposal of the Akademi was approved by the National Implementation Committee headed by Union Minister of Finance Pranab Mukherjee.

The General Council of the Sangeet Natak Akademi at its meeting held on December 13 and 14 this year held here unanimouslly selected 50 emeinent personalities in the field of performing arts for the Tagore Akademi Ratna and 50 eminent personalities for the Tagore Akademi Puraskar.

Fifty selected Tagore Akademi Ratna awardees were Satguru Jagjit Singh Namdhari, Rajanikanta Rao, P V Krishnamurthy, Laxmi Narayan Garg, B N Goswami, Birendranath Datta, M Nagabhushana Sarma, Prabha Atre, Laxman Krishnarao Pandit, Zia Fariduddin Dagar, Ghulam Mustafa Waris Khan, Abdul Halim Jaffer Khan, Ram Narayan, Sabri Khan, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Sripada Pinakapani, R.K. Sreekanthan, Nedunuri Krishna Murthy, M.S Gopalakrishnan, N Ramani, Vellore G. Ramabhadran, Guruvayur Dorai,Vanraj Bhatia, Vyjayanthimala Bali, Kalanidhi Narayanan, M K Saroja,  Kumudini Lakhia, Mankompu sivasankara Pillai, Mayadhar Raut, Pasumarthy Venugopala Krishna, Maya Rao, Amala Shankar, P K Narayanan Nambiar, Satyadev Dubey, Vijaya Mehta, Rajender Nath, Rudraprasad Sengupta, Alyque Padamsee, Soumitra Chatterjee, V Ramamurthy, Mohit Chattopadhyaya, R Nagarathnamma, Gurcharan Singh Ragi, Yamunabai Waikar, Kamala Murthy, Lalit Chandra Ojha, Sonam Tshering Lepcha, Arghya Sen, Kartar Singh and G Gourakishore Sharma.

Thirteen Tagore Akademi Puraskar selected in the field of music were Shankar Lal Mishra, Sunanda Patnaik, Ganesh Prasad Sharma, Amiya Ranjan Banerjee and  Babanrao Haldankar in Hindustani vocal,  Faiyaz Khan in Hindustani instrumentaL (Tabla), Tanjavore Shankara Iyer in Carnatic vocal, Mavelikkara R. Velukutty Nair in Carnatic instrumental(Mridanga), S.R.G. Rajanna – Carnatic instrumental(Nagaswaram), Thirukokarnam Chelliah – Carnatic instrumental (Thavil), Mayavaram Saraswathi in Carnatic instrumental (Flute), R Visweswaran in Carnatic instrumental (Veena) and Karam Chaoba Singh in other major traditions of music-Sankirtan(Ariba Pala).

Eleven artistes selected in the field of dance were Pandanallur Swaminathan Pillai, N.S. Jayalakshmi  and Rajee Narayan in Bharatanatyam, Chemencerri Kuniraman Nair  and Nattuvan Paramasiva Menon in Kathakali, Devjani Chaliha in Manipuri, Bhagavatula Yagna Narayan Sarma in Kuchipudi, Rita Devi in Odissi,  Haricharan Saikia in Sattriya,  Patrayani Sangeetha Rao and Bhagavatula Seetarama Sarma in Music for dance.

Eight artistes selected in the field of theatre were Bijoy Mishra  and K.M. Raghavan Nambiar in Playwriting, Prasad Sawkar, Chatla Sreeramulu, Sushma Seth and Jayamala Jayaram Shiledar in Acting,  Madhukar Toradmal  and Jalabala Vaidya & Gopal Sharman (Joint Award) in Direction.

Thirteen artistes selected in the field of traditional / folk / tribal / dance / music / theatre and puppetry were Jahoor Meer – Folk theatre of Haryana, Abungbam Kabui – Tribal dance of Manipur, Gambhari Devi – Folk music of Himachal Pradesh, Ali Mohamad Bhagat – Bhand Pather of Jammu & Kashmir,  Gopiram Borgayan – Traditional music of Assam, Sumitra SEN – Rabindra Sangeet of West Bengal, Bishwa Bandhu – Folk dance of Bihar, Hiralal Yadav – Birha folk music of Uttar Pradesh, Ramsahai Pande, – Folk dance of Madhya Pradesh, Satemmeren Longkumer – Folk song of Nagaland, Radha Krishna Kadam – Folk theatre of Maharastra, Anusuya Devi – Folk music of Andhra Pradesh, Mahipat Kavi – contemporary puppetry of Gujarat.

Five artistes selected  in the field of  overall contribution / scholarship in performing arts were M L Varad Pande, B M Sundaram,  Ramchandra Chintaman Dhere,  Raja Mrigendra Singh and Neelamadhab Panigrahi.