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An Indian among Rolex Enterprise Award winners

P. S. Suryanarayana

SINGAPORE: Chanda Shroff, a crafts teacher from India, is among the five "laureates" that Rolex, a corporate leader, has selected as the winners of its Awards for Enterprise for year 2006. These awards will be presented here on Thursday at a function to be graced by the Singapore President, S. R. Nathan.

The list of winners, each of whom would receive $ 100,000 and an inscribed gold Rolex chronometer, was announced by Rebecca Irvin, awards director, at a press conference here on Wednesday.

The principal criteria for selection as a "laureate" were the person's spirit of enterprise; the feasibility of the plan for which the award amount would serve as seed money; the ground-breaking originality of the endeavour being so supported; and an assessment of the project's positive impact on the community being served.

The 73-year-old Ms. Shroff was named for pioneering a movement in the Kutch region of Gujarat to revive its skills at hand embroidery and create sustainable means of income for the poor dependent on this avocation.

As the voluntary manager of `Shrujan,' a charitable trust, she was cited in appreciation for "preserving this unique heritage [of embroidery], while promoting an exquisite art form and empowering women in conservative societies."

The other 2006 laureates are Alexandra Lavrillier for work among nomadic group in Siberia; Brad Norman for whale shark conservation globally; Pilai Poonswad for saving the threatened hornbill species by drafting rural communities in Thailand; and Rory Wilson for developing an electronic logging device to track animals worldwide.

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