CHENNAI: The State government on Monday announced the winners for its Tamil New Year awards. Chief Minister Edapadi Palanisami will present the awards at the Secretariat on April 25. The Government honours scholars with awards in the name of Tamil scholars who worked for the development of Tamil. Tamil scholars M.A. Venkatakrishnan, Agniputhiran, Sri Lanka Jayaraj, T.M. Abdulkader, Uma Balu bagged the Tamil New year awards.
Prior to 2015, Tamil development awards were presented to only 5 scholars. Late Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa announced the awards for 55 scholars. On Monday the government announced Tamil New year awards and Tamil Semmal Awards. For the year 2016, Agniputhiran has been selected for Kapilar award, M.A. Venkatakrishnan for Ue.Va.Sa. award, Sri Lanka Jayaraj for Kambar award, P. Manikandan for Sollin Selvar award, Vaidhegi for G.U Pope award.
Tamil scholar T.M. Abdulkadar has been selected for Umarupulavar award, N. Nanjundan for Elangovadigal award, Hamsa Dhanagopal for Amma Literary award. Tamil scholar for translation awardees are Uma Balu, Nagalakshmi Shanmugam, A. Jaheer Hussain, Alla Pichai (a) Mohamed Barista, K. Chella-ppan, V. Saidhanya, C. Murugesan, K. Balasubramaniam, S. Arumugam Pillai, K.S. Subramanian. S.Murali has been selected for Kanini Tamil award for the year 2015.
The awardees will get Rs. 1 lakh and one soverign gold medal, certificate and shawl. For the Tamilthai award and Tamil association award. For the year 2015, the government has selected one person each in district for the Tamil Chemmal award.
