In order to commemorate the Golden Jubilee Celebrations of Photo Division, a Media Unit of Ministry of I&B, the National Photo Awards have been launched for the first time.

The awards shall be conferred by the Hon'ble Vice President of India, H.E.Shri M.Hamid Ansari, on 19th August, at a special function to mark the occasion at Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi. The awards shall be given as "Life Time Achievement Awards" to four eminent photojournalists. The awards include a cash prize of Rs.1.50 lakhs, a Shawl, a Memento and a Citation. The objective of constituting these awards is to honour the creative and long standing contribution of photographers in the field of photography.

The first category of awards shall honour two eminent Photojournalists. The first being Smt. Homai Vyarawalla of Vadodara, 97 years of age, popularly known as the First Indian Lady Photojournalist in the country. She is popularly known for her artistic work in the pre and post partition period. She studied in J J School of Art and started her career as a freelancer with Illustrated Weekly. Her depiction of political events has remained imprinted in public memory since several decades.

The second recipient is Shri S. Paul, 79 years of age, an eminent photojournalist who was the Chief Photographer of the Indian Express from 1962 to 1988 and the winner of the maximum photo awards in the country and abroad. First Indian to have been profiled with a portfolio of four pictures by the World's oldest and prestigious The British Journal Of Photography Annual 1967 followed by another portfolio with article in the 1969 edition (U.K).

In the Pictorialists category, the Life Time Achievement Award shall be conferred to Shri Benu Sen of Kolkata, 79 year old, a living legend in Pictorial photography. He is the Secretary-General, Federation of Indian Photography and President of Photographic Association of Dum Dum. His contribution both as an individual artist and as a promoter for the development of Indian Photography exceeds that of any living Indian Photographer. He has authored several books on Photography including the famous publication "Art of Photography" published in 1979. He has been adjudged the best Indian Pictorialist by the Camera World International, Australia and the Harvard Senetic Museum.

The second recipient in the Pictorialist category is Shri K.G. Maheshwari from Mumbai. 88 years old, Shri Maheswari has been a creative legend in Portrait Photography. He has participated in various International Exhibitions and has won over 400 awards. He was conferred the Honour of being an Associate of Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain (ARPS) in the year 1946. He was also conferred by the Photographic Society of India with its highest honour "The Honorary Life Membership" and has also been conferred with a number of Honorary Fellowship and membership by many national and international photographic organizations for his contribution in creative photography.

The Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, constituted a Committee under the Chairmanship of Shri Mike Pandey and Smt. Chitrangada Sharma, Shri Sondip Shankar and Shri V.B. Pyarelal, Joint Secretary as members and Shri Debatosh Sengupta, Director, Photo Division as Member Secretary to select the awardees.