New Delhi, March, 2020: Maharana of Mewar Charitable Foundation successfully concluded the 38th Maharana Mewar Foundation Awards ceremony at the colourfully decorated Manek Chowk of the City Palace in Udaipur on Sunday. 

Raj Chengappa, Group Editorial Director of the India Today Group, was the proud recipient of the prestigious Haldighati Award at the ceremony. Sharing the dais with the veteran journalist were luminaries like Dr. Norbert Peabody, a historian-anthropologist, who was honoured with the Col James Tod international award; Manhar Udhas, the singer-musician, with the Hakim Khan Sur Award and Ms. Purnota Dutta Bahl, a social entrepreneur-activist, whose work merited the Panna Dhai Award.

A grand but emotional start to the ceremony was the presentation of the 16 Bhamashah Awards, 17 Maharana Raj Singh Awards and 48 Maharana Fateh Singh Awards to students from schools and universities who had excelled in their curricular and extra-curricular activities.

The award distribution by the venerable Dr. K. Kasturirangan, as chief guest and Mr. Lakshyaraj Singh Mewar, Trustee of Maharana of Mewar Charitable Foundation (MMCF), was greeted with loud applause as every story of the young students’ achievements was inspiring and motivating.

The ceremony was graced by Tratiya Peethadhishwar Goswami 108, Shri Vrajesh Kumarji Maharaj, Goswami Shri Vedant Kumarji Bawa Saheb in the august presence of Shriji Arvind Singh Mewar of Udaipur, Chairman and Managing Trustee of MMCF.

“The 38th Maharana Mewar Foundation Awards mark a milestone in the 50 year-long history of the MMCF,” said Shriji. “Year after year we continue to celebrate the achievements of these men and women from different walks of life who are an inspiration for our entire nation,” he said, lauding the Awardees.

The Maharana Udai Singh Award was bestowed on Mr. Devilal Dhakar, a physically-challenged educationist who has planted more than 5000 saplings and trees in Bhilwara district of Rajasthan. Prof. Neeraj Sharma from Udaipur, a Vedic scholar received the Maharishi Harit Rashi Award for his works. 

The Maharana Mewar Award, instituted to honour works of permanent value rendered to society in the field of social service, nation-building and character-building activities was awarded to Mr. Dadarao Bilhore from Mumbai, who is popularly known as ‘the Pothole Dada’, a veteran journalist Mr. Anant Vijay from Ghaziabad and to the social activist Mr. Prakash Chand Sharma from Hindaun City, Karauli.

Prof. Bhanwar Lal Bhadani from Bikaner and Dr. Praveen Pandya from Jhalor were awarded the Maharana Kumbha Award for their academic and scholarly works. The Maharana Sajjan Singh Award is awarded to Mr. Amrit Lal Sirohiya, Jaipur.

The Dagar Gharana Award was bestowed on Ustad Sabir Sultan Khan, a gifted sarangi player who hails from a family of musicians in Rajasthan.

The Rana Punja Award was awarded to Dr. Mangi Lal Parihar, an engineer who is providing health relief at his workplace and community. The Aravali Award for outstanding achievements in sports and games from Rajasthan was awarded to young Ms. Gaurvi Singhvi who swam across the English Channel creating new records.

The year’s Best Police Station of Rajasthan Award was given to Chechat, Kota Rural, Kota, Rajasthan.

The Maharana Mewar Foundation Annual Scheme of Awards constitutes a major part of the activities of the Maharana of Mewar Charitable Foundation (MMCF), Udaipur. These Annual Awards were instituted in 1980 - 1981 to recognize college and school students, in Udaipur, for their academic and sporting achievements. The scope and spectrum of the awards has been steadily widening since 1981.

The MMCF is committed to nurturing centres of excellence in heritage management, fine arts, the performing arts, education, ecological management, hospitality, philanthropy, spirituality and sports. Unique in having conceived and actualized the practices of 'living heritage', the MMCF is sharing ancient legacies through broad-based and sustainable platforms of development within Rajasthan, in India and through global outreach programmes.

Over the last six decades, its activities and endeavours have resulted in employment generation, stemming the rural migration to urban areas and instilling greater pride in traditional professions and craftspeople. This approach to holistic and comprehensive development by the Foundation has been acknowledged internationally, most importantly receiving the prestigious WT Award in 2012 at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, for its ‘contribution to universal culture’.