New Delhi: Padma Shri awardee Sukri Bommagowda on Thursday said that the Halakki Vokkaliga community is happy after the PM Narendra Modi government awarded two people with the Padma Shri award belonging to the community, a day after the Prime Minister met her in Karnataka's Ankola, reported news agency ANI.
PM Modi on Wednesday met Padma Shri recipients Tulsi Gowda and Sukri Bommagowda in poll-bound Karnataka’s Ankola.
“I am very happy that PM Modi came here in Ankola. This is for the first time any Prime Minister came here. We all are very happy. Our children were very excited to see him. I gave my love and blessing to him,” said Sukri Bommagowda popularly called the nightingale of the Halakki Vokkaliga tribes.
When asked how she felt as the world recognises her community after winning the award, she said that it is a proud moment for all, and everyone in her community is elated.
“I felt very happy after getting the Padma Shri award, not only me my Halaki Vokaliga community felt very proud. My one simple request to the government is that they should include us under the ST category which will be beneficial to our community and secure our children’s future,” she told ANI.
Sukri Bommagowda won the Padma Shri, the third-highest civilian honour in the country, for folk singing in 2017.
Another Padma Shri recipient Tulsi Gowda said, “I am very happy that PM came from Delhi to meet Ankola people he took my blessing. I also met him in Delhi earlier we all were very happy to see him.”
Tulsi Gowda, an environmentalist, was conferred with the Padma Shri award in 2021.
“I felt very happy after receiving the Padma Shri award. Along with me, the whole of Uttar Kannada was delighted,” she added.
Gowda, who is from Honnali village in Karnataka, had planted more than 30,000 saplings and takes care of the nurseries of the forest department.