Who was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2026 for contribution to the financial sector (industry and trade)?
- (a)Ajay Piramal
- (b)Uday Kotak
- (c)Deepak Parekh
- (d)Raghuram Rajan
Correct — B, Uday Kotak. In the Padma Awards announced on 25 January 2026, Uday Kotak was named a Padma Bhushan awardee in the field of Trade and Industry. He founded Kotak Mahindra Finance in 1985 and, in 2003, converted it into Kotak Mahindra Bank — the first non-banking finance company in India to be granted a full banking licence by the Reserve Bank of India — and led the bank as Managing Director and CEO until 2023. He is the only one of the four names in this question on the 2026 Padma list.
- (a)Ajay Piramal — Chairman of the Piramal Group — a well-known figure in Indian business and finance, but he is not among the 13 Padma Bhushan awardees announced for 2026.
- (c)Deepak Parekh — The long-serving HDFC chairman was awarded the Padma Bhushan back in 2006 — a real award, but the wrong year. Awards already conferred years earlier are the classic distractor in this format.
- (d)Raghuram Rajan — Economist and Governor of the Reserve Bank of India (2013–16); he does not appear on the 2026 Padma Awards list.
The Padma Awards are India's second-highest tier of civilian honours, below the Bharat Ratna, and come in three grades — Padma Vibhushan (exceptional and distinguished service), Padma Bhushan (distinguished service of a high order) and Padma Shri (distinguished service). They were instituted in 1954, are announced every year on the eve of Republic Day, and are conferred by the President at Rashtrapati Bhavan later in the year. Nominations are open to the public through the padmaawards.gov.in portal and are screened by a Padma Awards Committee constituted by the Prime Minister. For 2026, 131 awards were approved — 5 Padma Vibhushan, 13 Padma Bhushan and 113 Padma Shri.
Award questions look like pure memory, but they are usually solvable by elimination if you know the field-year pairs. Here three of the four names are giants of Indian finance — which is exactly the trap; the setter is betting you will pick the most famous financier rather than the 2026 awardee. Deepak Parekh is the most seductive wrong answer because he genuinely holds a Padma Bhushan, only from 2006. Fix each Padma name to its year and its field ('Trade and Industry', 'Public Affairs', 'Art'), because state PSCs ask this pair, not just the name.
- Padma Bhushan 2026, field Trade and Industry: Uday Kotak, founder of Kotak Mahindra Bank
- Padma Awards 2026: 131 in all — 5 Padma Vibhushan, 13 Padma Bhushan, 113 Padma Shri; announced 25 January 2026
- Kotak Mahindra Finance became Kotak Mahindra Bank in 2003 — the first Indian NBFC to receive an RBI banking licence
- Padma Awards were instituted in 1954; they are not titles and are not to be used as a prefix or suffix to the recipient's name
- Deepak Parekh received the Padma Bhushan in 2006
- Assuming Padma Awards are 'titles' banned by Article 18 — the Supreme Court has held they are not titles, so long as they are not used as name prefixes
- Picking a famous name who received the same award in a different year (Deepak Parekh, 2006)
- Confusing Padma Bhushan with Padma Vibhushan — the grades carry different fields and different numbers each year
MPPSC and other state PSCs ask straight recall — 'who received award X in year Y in field Z' — often with three plausible names from the same profession; UPSC prefers the structural angle (Article 18, how many awards, whether they were ever suspended).
Consider the following statements in respect of Bharat Ratna and Padma Awards : 1. Bharat Ratna and Padma Awards are titles under the Article 18(1) of the Constitution of India. 2. Padma Awards, which were instituted in the year 1954, were suspended only once. 3. The number of Bharat Ratna Awards is restricted to a maximum of five in a particular year. Which of the above statements are not correct?
- (a) 1 and 2 only
- (b) 2 and 3 only
- (c) 1 and 3 only
- (d) 1,2 and3
Answer(d) 1, 2 and 3 — none of the three statements is correct.
The same civilian-honours system, tested from the structural side — whether Padma Awards are Article 18 titles, when they were instituted and how often they were suspended.
Which of the following individuals was not a recipient of the Padam Vibhushan award in 2024 ?
- (a) Ms. Vyjayantimala Bali
- (b) Shri Konidela Chiranjeevi
- (c) Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu
- (d) Shri A.R. Rahman
Answer(d) Shri A.R. Rahman
MPPSC asked the identical 'which Padma awardee in which year' recall one year earlier, only in the NOT-a-recipient form.
Who among the following was awarded Padma Vibhushan – 2023 in the field of Science and Engineering?
- (a) Shri S. M. Krishna
- (b) Shri Dilip Mahalanabis
- (c) Shri Srinivasa Varadhan
- (d) Shri Narinder Singh Kapany
Answer(c) Shri Srinivasa Varadhan
Same pattern again — MPPSC pairs a Padma awardee with the exact field and year, which is why the field label matters as much as the name.
- practice — not a real PYQ
In which year were the Padma Awards instituted?
- (a)1950
- (b)1954
- (c)1957
- (d)1961
Answer(b) 1954 — the Padma Awards were instituted in 1954, the same year as the Bharat Ratna.
- practice — not a real PYQ
With reference to the Padma Awards, consider the following statements: 1. They are normally announced on the eve of Republic Day every year. 2. A recipient may use the award as a title prefixed to his or her name. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a)1 only
- (b)2 only
- (c)Both 1 and 2
- (d)Neither 1 nor 2
Answer(a) 1 only — the announcement is made on Republic Day eve, but the awards are not titles and government instructions bar their use as a prefix or suffix to the recipient's name.