VIJAYAWADA: The Andhra Pradesh government on Tuesday announced the names of recipients of Kala Ratna (Hamsa) awards, 2017. The awards will be presented as part of the Hevalambi Nama Samvatsara Ugadi celebrations to 38 eminent persons for outstanding contribution in their respective fields.
Guntur district has the highest number of awardees (10), followed by Krishna district (9). The awardees from Guntur district are Uma Chowdary (Harikatha), Mahankali Surya Narayana Sastry (Kuchipudi), Potluri Venkateswara Rao (journalism), Maremani Srinivasa Rao (painting), Akkam Sriram (sculpture), Neti Parameswara Sarma (theatre), Tummapudi Koteswara Rao (literature), Kondapolu Basava Punnaiah (social service), Mannem Venkat Rayudu (social service) and Naidu Gopi (theatre).
The award recipients from Krishna district are D Uma Maheswari (Harikatha), Gangadhara Sastry (music), Sarada Ramakrishna (Andhra Natyam), Vemuri Venkata Viswanath (music), Cherukuri Veeraiah (engineering), Ballem Rosaiah (engineering), Manepalli Rushi Kesava Rao alias Nagnamuni (literature), P Satyavathi (literature) and TS Rao (social service).
Prominent awardees from the remaining districts are - Gollapudi Maruthi Rao (actor and writer), Vangapandu Prasad (folk) from Visakhapatnam; Garikapati Narasimha Rao (Avadhanam) from East Godavari; Ch Anant Sriram (lyricist – Yuva Pratibha) and Kadali Suresh (drama) from West Godavari; Satish Reddy (science) and Sai Krishna Yachandra (Sangeeta Avadhanam) from Nellore; Kalisha and Subhani (Nadaswaram), SM Peeran (sculpture) and A Murali Krishna (TV anchor) from Prakasam; Singamaneni Narayana (literature) and Potluri Harikrishna (promotion of Telugu language) from Anantapur; K Sanjeeva Rao alias Sikhamani (poetry) from Yanam; Palleti Laxmi Kula Sekhar (theatre) and Jayanna (painting) from Kadapa: K Siva Prasada Reddy (handicrafts) from Kurnool; Meegada Ramalinga Swamy (theatre) from Srikakulam district; and also Chittor Revathi Ratnaswamy (vocal/music) from Hyderabad and Radha Krishna Raju (social service) from Karnataka.