I just got done watching the CNN-IBN Indian of the Year 2008 awards ceremony on TV.
In summary, the awards in the six categories were as follows:
Politics - Nitish Kumar, Chief Minister, Bihar
Sports - Abhinav Bindra, Olympic Gold Medalist
Business - Aditya Puri of HDFC
Entertainment - Aamir Khan, Actor
Public Service - Madhavan Nair and Team Chandrayaan at ISRO
Global Indian - A. R. Rahman, Musician
Apart from these, there were special achievement awards made to Sheila Dixit, Dilip Kumar as well as the officers in the Mumbai police for their valour in the attacks on 26th November.
The categorization for the various awards was understandable - excellance in any field is to be appreciated and in that respect I think all of the awardees were well qualified.
The final award of THE Indian of the year 2008, was announced at the end and persons from the eminent audience gathered for the award ceremony were asked to comment on who they felt deserved the crowning glory of the evening. The choice would have to be made from the six awardees in the various categories.
Up until this point, Yours Truly was impressed with the selections and the awards being handed out but as usual, I had to find something to rant about.
It was initially a note-worthy point when one member of the audience took a stand that in his opinion, it was those who fought for Mumbai during the terror attacks who truly deserve this award. What became silly was when a dozen (ok, i exaggerate. bear with me) other people stood up to repeat the same when asked who they would choose for the award. The officers and soldiers did a truly sterling job for the country in the time of need, and yes we all DO need to be extremely proud and thankful to them. It irks me though, when people try to draw so much drama and screen-time from something genuine like this. Rather than stand up at the slightest opportunity to proclaim our solidarity with cause (and hence state how noble we are), I think we would be much better off remembering that they did their jobs, and that we should too. In this case, I would have been a lot more interested to know the comments on who of the six should be made Indian of the Year.
Moving on, there were some other people who ventured to state their choices from the list of six. I was personally rooting for Madhavan Nair or Nitish Kumar and I'm glad to say that Madhavan Nair along with Team Chandrayaan was ultimately declared winner. All along though, I was wondering what it meant to call someone Indian of the year, especially when there were certain opinions that A.R.Rahman should be awarded.
Service to the nation and professional excellence need not be one and the same all the time. While we as a nation have the need for a global identity, we also urgently need a reconciliation of so many things within ourselves - not all what we do is for the world outside. Is the magnitude of the achievement the indicator of the most noteworthy? How do we evaluate magnitude anyway?
When professional excellence helps put India on the world map, that is something to be proud of too! But there are so many people working in so many ways for the people and to better the nation as a whole.
If we had to choose between the two, which do we pick, and how do we justify?
In summary, the awards in the six categories were as follows:
Politics - Nitish Kumar, Chief Minister, Bihar
Sports - Abhinav Bindra, Olympic Gold Medalist
Business - Aditya Puri of HDFC
Entertainment - Aamir Khan, Actor
Public Service - Madhavan Nair and Team Chandrayaan at ISRO
Global Indian - A. R. Rahman, Musician
Apart from these, there were special achievement awards made to Sheila Dixit, Dilip Kumar as well as the officers in the Mumbai police for their valour in the attacks on 26th November.
The categorization for the various awards was understandable - excellance in any field is to be appreciated and in that respect I think all of the awardees were well qualified.
The final award of THE Indian of the year 2008, was announced at the end and persons from the eminent audience gathered for the award ceremony were asked to comment on who they felt deserved the crowning glory of the evening. The choice would have to be made from the six awardees in the various categories.
Up until this point, Yours Truly was impressed with the selections and the awards being handed out but as usual, I had to find something to rant about.
It was initially a note-worthy point when one member of the audience took a stand that in his opinion, it was those who fought for Mumbai during the terror attacks who truly deserve this award. What became silly was when a dozen (ok, i exaggerate. bear with me) other people stood up to repeat the same when asked who they would choose for the award. The officers and soldiers did a truly sterling job for the country in the time of need, and yes we all DO need to be extremely proud and thankful to them. It irks me though, when people try to draw so much drama and screen-time from something genuine like this. Rather than stand up at the slightest opportunity to proclaim our solidarity with cause (and hence state how noble we are), I think we would be much better off remembering that they did their jobs, and that we should too. In this case, I would have been a lot more interested to know the comments on who of the six should be made Indian of the Year.
Moving on, there were some other people who ventured to state their choices from the list of six. I was personally rooting for Madhavan Nair or Nitish Kumar and I'm glad to say that Madhavan Nair along with Team Chandrayaan was ultimately declared winner. All along though, I was wondering what it meant to call someone Indian of the year, especially when there were certain opinions that A.R.Rahman should be awarded.
Service to the nation and professional excellence need not be one and the same all the time. While we as a nation have the need for a global identity, we also urgently need a reconciliation of so many things within ourselves - not all what we do is for the world outside. Is the magnitude of the achievement the indicator of the most noteworthy? How do we evaluate magnitude anyway?
When professional excellence helps put India on the world map, that is something to be proud of too! But there are so many people working in so many ways for the people and to better the nation as a whole.
If we had to choose between the two, which do we pick, and how do we justify?
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