1. Noted Hindi writer Professor Ramdarash Mishra was selected for the 21st Vyas Samman for his poetry collection Aam Ke Patte.

2. US President Barack Obama will award nine scholars the 2011 National Medal for Humanities including India’s Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen.

3. Nancy J Powell, the new US ambassador to India.

4. Historian Ramachandra Guha’s India After Gandhi and novels and essays by Gopalakrishna Pai, Kashinath Singh and Manik Sitaram Godghate alias Grace are among 22 books which were awarded prestigious Sahitya Akademi Awards for this year.

5. Former India cricket team captain Sunil Gavaskar was formally inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.

6. Maruti Suzuki India, has crossed the 1-crore (10-million) units milestone of cumulative sales in the domestic market since it started selling cars 29 years back