Bharti Group chief Sunil Mittal presented Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for Excellence
New Delhi: Bharti group Chairman and Managing Director Sunil Mittal
was conferred upon Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for Excellence in Public Administration, Academics and Management for the year 2009 on Wednesday for his
superior business leadership by the President Pratibha Devisingh Patil in the national capital. Mittal, while accepting the award named after former Prime Minister
Lal Bahadur Shastri, said he was greatly influenced by the ideals of Lal Bahadur
Shastri, and would try to carry forward his message through his business and
philanthropic
activities. "I still remember one of his urgings to the nation, to the people
of India, when we had severe food shortage, was to have one meal a day. As a young
lad, I was one of those children who decided to have one meal a day for few days.
I am, therefore, extremely grateful for this and grateful to the jury and I do
hope that going forward, we will be able to through our business, our philanthropic
activities, carry this message forward," said Mittal. Mittal has created one of
the leading business groups in India with interests in telecommunications, financial
services, retail, manufacturing, realty and agri-business. India added a record
16.7 million mobile users in October, upsetting the trend of 10 to 12 million
average monthly additions seen till then. The new users are coming in from smaller
cities, or what are termed 'B' and 'C' circles, industry players said.
