Vanitha Iyer, who stayed in Nagpur previously, has got National Award for Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (PwD)- 2019 in Hearing Disability category. This is the second time that she has got the national award. M Venkaiah Naidu, Vice President of India, presented the prestigious award to Iyer. Thawarchand Gehlot, Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment; Krishan Pal Gurjar and Ramdas Athwale, Union Ministers of State, also were present on the occasion.
She won the award for being the Best Employee. The awards ceremony was held at Vigyan Bhavan, Delhi. All the award winners were invited to the residence of Ram Nath Kovind, President of India, in the evening and they had an opportunity to interact with the President. Vanitha is married to Manikandan from Nagpur. After marriage, she took a transfer to Nagpur while serving in New India Assurance Company as Officer/Administration. She applied for the Best Employee Award-2019, and was chosen for the same. Born in Mumbai, Vanitha Iyer did her schooling in Chennai.
Her parents enrolled her for karate, skating, drawing, painting, swimming, acting and dance classes. She became the first child of her kind in the country to geta blackbelt in karate. Then Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu Dr Karunanidhi congratulated her.
Vanitha did first public performance of ‘Bharatnatyam’ at the age of nine years, in Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. She also appeared in a movie ‘Malli’ made by noted director Santosh Sivan. The movie won a National Award. She also won the Most Popular Child Award from the school in Std IV, and scholarship as long as she wanted to study in the school. In 2003, she returned to Mumbai as her parents stayed there.
She completed BE (Electronics and Telecommunication) in first class from South Indian Education Society (SIES) Engineering College in Nerul, New Mumbai. Vanitha never attended any tuition classes during her academic years. She got financial assistance from NHFDC and also from Alexander Graham Bell, USA. She served in Bank of Baroda as a single window operator, and got her first National Award in 2013 as Role Model (Female).Later, she joined New India Assurance Company as Officer/Administration. In 2014, she got Achiever (Bharari) Award from NMMC, Mumbai. She has to her credit Ugadi Puraskar from Telugu Academy, Junior Citizen Award, and several awards of Lions and Rotary Clubs
