Dashing Indian opening batsman Virender Sehwag, Olympic bronze-medal winning boxer Vijender Singh and world ranked badminton star Saina Nehwal were among the six sportspersons named for the Padma Shri award in the Republic Day honours list announced Monday.
Hockey player Ignace Tirkey, reputed cricket coach Ramakant Vithal Achrekar and India's first Formula One driver Narain Karthikeyan were the other three in the list.
The 31-year-old Sehwag is among the most explosive openers in the cricketing world. Sehwag is the first Indian to hit two triple centuries in Tests.
The India vice-captain, who has 13,000 international runs, received the Arjuna Award in 2002.
If it was nawab of Najafgarh who got the award in cricket, it was the boxer from another non-descript place Bhiwani, who got the honours having missed it last year.
Vijender has been silencing his critics with his consistent performance in the ring. He won the bronze in the World championship in September, the first ever medal for India in the event, and then became the world's number one boxer in the middle weight (75kg) category, another first for India.
