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Awards & HonoursHard

The Padma Awards Committee, which considers nominations each year, is headed by whom?

  1. A.The Home Minister
  2. B.The Cabinet Secretary
  3. C.The Vice President
  4. D.The Chief Justice of India

Correct answer

B. The Cabinet Secretary

Explanation

The correct answer is B, the Cabinet Secretary. The Padma Awards Committee is constituted afresh by the Prime Minister each year and is headed by the Cabinet Secretary, with the Home Secretary, the Secretary to the President and a number of eminent persons as members. Its recommendations go to the Prime Minister and then to the President.

Option A, the Home Minister, leads the ministry that administers the awards, which makes the option convincing, but the committee is not chaired at the political level. Option C, the Vice President, has no role in this process; the President confers the awards. Option D, the Chief Justice of India, is placed here because the awards were once challenged in court, but the judiciary does not select recipients. A related fact often asked alongside is that nominations may come from any citizen, including a self-nomination, since the process was opened to the public.

Read the full article: Bharat Ratna and Padma Awards: Rules and Firsts

Practice Questions

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Q3.Awards & HonoursMedium

Who were the first recipients of the Bharat Ratna in 1954?

  1. A.Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel and Rajendra Prasad
  2. B.C. Rajagopalachari, S. Radhakrishnan and C. V. Raman
  3. C.B. R. Ambedkar, C. V. Raman and Zakir Husain
  4. D.Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi and C. Rajagopalachari
Show answer
Correct answer: B. C. Rajagopalachari, S. Radhakrishnan and C. V. Raman

All three were honoured in 1954, the first year of the award. Rajagopalachari was the last Governor-General of India, Radhakrishnan was a philosopher who later became President, and Raman was the physicist who discovered the effect that carries his name.