The 22nd Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Awards for 2016 would be conferred on two eminent personalities Guru Kishor Kumar Mohanty and Jharana Das for their achievements in the fields of Odishi dance and cinema, respectively.

For the last 21 years, the Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Award has been presented on an annual basis to exceptional individuals in the fields of dance, music, theatre and cinema with a cash prize of `50,000 and a citation each. However, from this year the award amount would be increased to `1 lakh each, Srjan director Ratikant Mohapatra informed at a Press meet here on Wednesday.

The Srjan would conduct its award ceremony from September 5 to 9 at the Rabindra Mandap here.

“We had started the festival as a single-day event in 1995. Now, the festival is a five-day celebration of scintillating performances featuring seven artists and a dance recital by Srjan’s own repertoire group,” said Mohapatra.

The aim of the festival is to give the audience of the State an exposure to classical fare of the highest level, he said.

He further informed that the Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Yuva Pratibha Samman would be reinstituted with a cash prize of Rs 25,000 each to four meritorious young artists in the areas of classical dances and Odishi music for their outstanding continuous performance.

The Nalco would sponsor the awards, and the name of the award would be the ‘Nalco Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Award 2016’.

The ‘Nalco Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Yuva Pratibha Samman 2016’ would be presented to Rajib Bhattacharya from Kolkata and Madhusmita Mohanty for Odishi dance. P Praveen Kumar from Bangalore would get the award for Bharatanatyam and Rupak Kumar Parida for Odishi music.

A special award ‘Nrutya Kala Samman’ would be conferred on Madhubrata Satapathy with a cash prize of `30,000.

Dancers of the Srjan would present a piece ‘Tyaaga’, choreographed and composed by Guru Ratikant Mohapatra. Besides, dancers from the State and outside would also perform.