Hamsadhwani’s Distinguished Citizen Award presented to industrialist B. Santhanam

Minister for AI, IT and Digital Services R. Kumar on Tuesday presented the Distinguished Citizen Award-2026 to industrialist B. Santhanam at the Youth Hostel here. The award was instituted by Hamsadhwani to mark its 36th anniversary.

In his address, Mr. Kumar said Tamil Nadu was a land where culture and language had travelled together for ages.

Today, artificial intelligence offers unprecedented opportunities to create repositories for our culture and Tamil language, he said.

Hamsadhwani secretary R. Sundar said the idea of a Distinguished Citizen Award was suggested by the organisation’s founder R. Ramachandran, and the first awardee was Dr. V. Shantha of the Adyar Cancer Institute.

Hamsadhwani president Seetharaman said that Mr. Santhanam was the former chairman and CEO of Saint Gobain, Asia Pacific and India Region, and an alumnus of IIT-Madras & IIM, Ahmedabad. He has had a remarkable career of over four decades with Saint Gobain Group, Mr. Seetharaman added.

During his tenure as the managing director, he led investments of over Euro 1.5 billion and established a world class manufacturing footprint in India.