The New Indian Express wishes its readers a BHUBANESWAR l monday l january 26, 2026 l `9.00 l PAGES 14 l JEYPORE EDITION A demonstrator weeps during a candlelight vigil during a protest in response to the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday | ap | P11 Our offices will remain closed today and there will be no issue of the paper on Tuesday. CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI CPI overhaul New inflation basket to track OTT fees, rent D IPA K M O N D A L @ New Delhi THE basket for Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures retail inflation, is set for a makeover. Digital consumption will assume greater significance in the new CPI basket with online media and OTT platforms being tracked. Rural house rent will be included, making the housing index more representative. Coverage of house rent has also been expanded in urban areas. Saurabh Garg, secretary, Ministry of Statistics and Programme implementation, said the new CPI basket—based on Household Consumption Expenditure Survey 2023–24—will see significant expansion. “At all-India level, the number of weighted items will increase from 299 in the 2012 series to 358 in 2024 series,” he said, adding the revamped CPI basket will be more contemporary . VS, Dharmendra awarded Padma Vibhushan Actor Mammootty, banker Uday Kotak, cricketers Rohit Sharma & Harmanpreet Kaur among awardees Ashok Chakra for Shubhanshu Shukla E x p r e s s ne w s s e r v i c e @ New Delhi FORMER Kerala chief minister V S Achuthanandan and actor Dharmendra were among awardees to posthumously receive the second-highest civilian honour, Padma Vibhushan, for 2026, the government announced on Sunday . The Union government announced 131 Padma awards for 2026, including five Padma Vibhushan, 13 Padma Bhushan and 113 Padma Shri on the eve of the Republic Day. Ninety awardees are women, six foreigners/NRIs/OCIs, and 16 posthumous recipients. Other Padma Vibhushan awardees include former Supreme Court Justice K T Thomas (public affairs), Hindustani classical violinist N Rajam (art), and eminent Malayalam journalist P Narayanan (literature and education). Padma Bhushan recipients e x p r e s s ne w s s e r v i c e @ New Delhi Dharmendra, actor V S Achuthanandan former Kerala CM feature playback legend Alka Yagnik, Malayalam superstar Mammootty, tennis icon Vijay Amritraj, and banker Uday Kotak. Senior BJP leader VK Malhotra, JMM founder and former Jharkhand CM Shibu Soren, and advertising maverick Piyush Pandey were awarded posthumously . Among the 113 Padma Shri awardees are Indian cricket captain Rohit Shar ma and women’s cricket captain Harmanpreet Kaur. Hockey stars Savita Punia and Baldev Singh, Uday Kotak, banker Mammootty, actor and para-athlete Praveen Kumar also feature on the list. Bollywood actors R Madhavan, Prosenjit Chatterjee, and Satish Shah received Padma Shri, alongside former JNU V-C Jagadesh Kumar and whistleblower R V S Mani, a former MHA official who exposed attempts to suppress information in Ishrat Jahan case. ISRO scientist A E Muthunayagam, DRDO’s Chandramouli Gaddamanugu, and former CRPF DG K Vijay Kumar were P9, 13 also honoured. GROUP Captain Shubhanshu Shukla has been approved for the Ashok Chakra to be awarded by President Droupadi Murmu on the eve of the 77th Republic Day, for his role in India’s return to the human spaceflight through the International Space Station (ISS) mission last year. Group Capt Shukla became the first InShubhanshu Shukla dian to visit the ISS during the Axiom-4 mission, completing an 18-day stay in orbit. The mission marked India’s return to human spaceflight after four decades, following Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma’s historic spaceflight aboard Soyuz mission in 1984. Four from Odisha chosen for Padma Shri award E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Bhubaneswar Four ‘unsung heroes’ from Odisha are among the 131 names chosen for the Padma Awards this year. The awardees are eminent educationist and folklorist Mahendra Kumar Mishra (73), Santhali researcher and educator Charan Hembram (76), renowned Prahallada Nataka artist Simanchal Patro (98) and master weaver and tie-and-dye artist Sarat Kumar Patra (60). All four have been selected for the Padma Shri, the country’s fourth-highest civilian honour, in recognition of their outstanding contributions to education, literature, folk theatre, music and traditional arts. Mishra, a native of Sinapali in Nuapada district, is a distinguished linguist, folklorist and educationist who has devoted decades to documenting and preserving Odisha’s rich oral traditions, particularly those of tribal communities. He has worked closely with institutions such as UNESCO, NCERT and Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi. Hembram, hailing from Nuagaon in Mayurbhanj district, has been a tireless advocate for the Santali language and tribal education for more than three decades. A researcher, educator and writer, Hembram has es- tablished several institutions aimed at making education accessible to tribal children. An exponent of Prahallada Nataka, a traditional folk theatre form, Simanchal has dedicated his life to preserving and propagating the centuries-old art. A resident of Bomkai in Ganjam district, Simanchal has mastered more than 35 ragas and over 300 songs associated with folk art form. Born into a traditional hand- loom family in Hariharpurpatana of Cuttack district, Sarat is known for his exceptional craftsmanship in Odisha’s famed handloom tradition. A master weaver, he creates a wide-range of exquisite handwoven textiles, including sarees, dress materials and dhotis, using cotton, silk and bapta (cotton-silk blend) yarns. His fabrics are also offered to Lord Jagannath in Puri on festive P2 occasions. Veteran journalist Mark Tully dies at 90 E x p r e s s ne w s s e r v i c e @ New Delhi Veteran journalist and acclaimed author Mark Tully passed away at a private hospital in Delhi on Sunday . He had been unwell for some time and was admitted to Max Hospital in Saket, south Delhi, on January 21. Born in Calcutta (now Kolkata) on October 24, 1935, Tully served as the BBC’s bureau chief in New Delhi for 22 years. His work with the British broadcaster included coverage of several defining moments in post-Independence Indian history, such as the 1971 India-Pakistan war, the Emergency of Mark Tully 1975–77, Operation Blue Star, the assas1935–2026 sination of Indira Gandhi and the antiSikh riots in 1984, the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi in 1991, and the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992. He authored several books on India, including No Full Stops in India, India in Slow Motion, and The Heart of India. He was knighted in 2002 and received the Padma P9 Bhushan from the Government of India in 2005.