For 2021, the Akademy announced the names of Pandit Deenanath Mishra in classical singing, Shrikant Vaishya in folk singing, Prabhu Dayal of Kanpur in 'nakkara' playing and Jawahar Lal of Varanasi in shehnai playing. (Credits: Facebook/ Pandit Dinanath Mishra)The Uttar Pradesh Sangeet Natak Akademy awards were announced on Monday for 45 artists in the fields of music, dance, theatre, and folk arts for the years 2021 to 2024.The Akademi will also give away the Safdar Hashmi Award and the BM Shah Award for the same period for “remarkable contribution in the field of theatre and stage”.Announcing the names, chairman Jayant Khot said the Akademy was committed to preserving and promoting UP’s rich cultural heritage and a special programme will be organised soon to present the awards.For 2021, the Akademy announced the names of Pandit Deenanath Mishra in classical singing, Shrikant Vaishya in folk singing, Prabhu Dayal of Kanpur in ‘nakkara’ playing and Jawahar Lal of Varanasi in shehnai playing. Bhoomikeshwar Singh will get the award for theatre direction, Jagmohan Rawat for theatre technical lighting, Rajkumar Srivastava for ‘nautanki’ direction and Vijay Pandit for playwriting.Mohan Swaroop Bhatia of Mathura and Mala Hombal of Varanasi will be given the award for art promotion. In the field of dance, Pratibha Sharma, a Bharatanatyam dancer from Mathura-Vrindavan, will be honoured with the award for the same year.Manoj Kumar Mishra of Rewa in Madhya Pradesh will get the Safdar Hashmi Award and Satish Anand of Delhi the BM Shah Award for 2021.For 2022, Anand Kumar Malik and Madhuri Sharma of Mathura will get the Akademi award for classical singing and folk singing, Pandit Anuj Mishra of Lucknow in kathak dance, Shashikant Pathak for playing ‘pakhawaj’ and Pankaj Kumar Srivastava of Prayagraj for playing tabla. Also, the names of Sunil Pawagi were announced for playing guitar, Mohan Lal Kunwar for playing flute, Manju Kaushal for theatre acting and Meraj Alam for theatre puppetry. Vijay Shankar Mishra of Varanasi will get the award for playwriting, music, dance and theatre, while Padmakant Sharma of Sitapur will be honoured for art criticism.Story continues below this adAlso, Rajesh Singh of New Delhi will get the Safdar Hashmi Award and Kamal Jain of Bhopal the BM Shah Award for the same year.For 2023, the Akademy will honour Ramshankar in the field of classical singing, Manoj Gupta for light music singing and Rakesh Srivastava for folk singing. Akanksha Srivastava of Lucknow will be honoured for Kathak dance, Anoop Banerjee for tabla playing and Chetan Kumar Joshi for flute playing. In the field of theatre and stage, Rajkumar Upadhyay will get the award for direction, Sanjay Degalurkar for acting, Uma Trigunayat for writing music and dance, Omendra Kumar for art promotion and Arjundas Kesari for art criticism.The Safdar Hashmi Award for 2023 will be given to Ajay Kumar of Ghaziabad and the BM Shah Award to Ravishankar Khare of Gorakhpur.For 2024, Ritesh Rajneesh Mishra will get the Akademi award for classical singing, Mukta Chatterjee for light music singing and Ramasth Pandey for folk ballad Alha. Also, Sugam Singh Shekhawat will get the award for folk dance, Mangal Prasad for playing ‘dukkad’, Sukhdev Mishra for playing violin and Rajesh Shah of Varanasi for playing sitar. In the field of theatre, Sushma Sharma will get the award for direction, Ravikant Shukla Shibbu for acting, Rajesh Pandit for art promotion and Shashiprabha Tiwari for art criticism for the same year.Story continues below this adThe Safdar Hashmi Award for 2024 will be given to Shubhdeep Raha of Lucknow and the BM Shah Award to Sanjay Mehta of Bhopal.