From Lion’s Sunny Pawar to Sachin Tendulkar, The Asian Awards honours the best from Asia
Saturday was a night of glitz, glamour and tributes to outstanding achievements by the Asian community in every field. The 7th edition of the Asian Awards kicked of in style at the Hilton Park Lane and the star studded evening was definitely one to remember, with cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar winning the Fellowship Award and child actor Sunny Pawar picking up the Rising Star Award. The ceremony, which celebrates excellence in the global Asian community also paid tribute to actor Om Puri, who died, aged 66, earlier this year, with the Outstanding Achievement in Cinema Award.
The award ceremony was hosted by comedian Sanjeev Bhaskar, who is best known for his work in BBC2’s Goodness Gracious Me and The Kumars at No. 42. Present at the event was CEO of State Bank of India Mr Sanjeev Chadha who presented the Business Leader of the Year to MasterCard chief executive Ajay Banga.
Joining in the celebrations this year was Here and Now 365‘s Managing Director Manish Tiwari, who presented the award for Outstanding Achievement in Music to the Sultan of Music Adnan Sami along with singer Naughty Boy. Talking about the event Manish said: “Adnan Sami was born and brought up in the UK and despite his Western upbringing he excelled in Eastern music as well, and his music transcended cultures and was a perfect blend of East and West making him a global musician. After his iconic performance at the Wembley Arena this year, it is a great honour to present Adnan Sami with the Outstanding Achievement in Music award. I would also like to congratulate Paul Sagoo for organising another successful edition of The Asian Awards and on honouring people who have achieved the highest levels in their craft.”
Other winners included Chinese snooker player Ding Junhui, who received the outstanding achievement in sport, Channel 4 news journalist Krishnan Guru-Murthy who collected the outstanding achievement in television award, Sir Harpal Kumar, the chief executive of Cancer Research UK, was awarded the outstanding contribution to the community accolade, Japanese businessman Masayoshi Son, who founded telecommunications giant SoftBank, won the entrepreneur of the year award. The social entrepreneur of the year award went to Nicha Dutt for his work at Intellecap and Demis Hassabis, who founded Google-owned artificial intelligence company DeepMind, collected the outstanding achievement in science & technology award.
Attending the event was Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, Bollywood actors Varun Dhawan and Amy Jackson, television presenter Saira Khan, Tony Litt from Sunrise Radio who also presented the Fellowship Award with Gurdev Jassi, Head of Retail of ICICI Bank Ashesh Jani, Head of Star TV UK Mr Gurjeev Kapoor with his wife, Dragon’s Dens newest addition Tej Lalvani with his wife Tara, Illy Jaffer from Chivas, Lord Karan Bilamoria, Philantropist and Businessman Dr Rami Ranger, Mrs and Mr GP Hinduja and Sunny Arora of Spectrum Events.
Here and Now 365 has always prided itself for promoting multiculturalism and celebrating the ethnic diversity of the UK.