Click to play videoNew Delhi: India's first photo-journalist, 97-year-old Homai Vyarawala has been honoured with the Padma Vibushan, India's second highest civilian honour for her outstanding work in the field of art and photography.
She's elated, but says the best day of her life was her presence in Delhi on the day India became an independent country.
The Gujarat-based 98-year-old photographer is among the 32 other women Padma awardees to be feted this year.
"This is a recognition of my photography. I am very happy to be given the country's second highest civilian honour," she said.
Vyarawala, who was born in 1913 into a priestly family in Navsari in Gujarat, began her career as a photographer with the Bombay Chronicle in 1938.
Now based in Vadodara, 97-year old Homai Vyarawala is happy at being conferred with the Padma Vibhushan.
In August last year too, she was honoured with a lifetime achievement award by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. But Vyarawala says her joy would be double if her husband were alive today.
"It would be ideal if my husband would be alive. It would have given me more joy," she said.
Vyarawala is a witness to almost an entire century having captured the social and political life of a nation in transition, tracing both its triumphs and tribulations.
She's credited with capturing the first Tricolour hoisting ceremony at the Red Fort, the departure of Lord Mountbatten and the funerals of Pandit Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi, among other memorable and historic moments. But she remembers August 15, 1947 most fondly.
"I was in Delhi on the day that India became independent. That is indeed the best day of my life," said Vyarawala.
And although Vyarawala is nearing a hundred years of age, her zest and enthusiasm has not ebbed a bit.
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