Engineering Superstars honoured at the Indo-Canada Ottawa Business Chamber’s annual gala

A pair of engineering superstars, a leader in green technology, a charity ball-organizing dentist and a community-minded public servant were honoured at the Indo-Canada Ottawa Business Chamber’s annual gala held Sept. 19 at the Hilton Lac-Leamy.

Havelin Manju Anand, whose last two roles before retirement were as a director general at Status of Women and at Indian and Northern Affairs, was an award winner.

So was dentist Nalin Bhargava, whose charity work includes creating The Maharaja’s Ball. It returns to the gala scene in 2011 with a new partner: the Sens Foundation. Niraj Bhargava was honoured as co-founder, chairman and CEO of Energate, a company specializing in home energy-management solutions.

Praveen Jain, Canada Research chair in Power Electronics and director of the Centre for Energy and Power Electronics Research at Queen’s University, landed an award, as did Jag Humar, distinguished research professor and professor emeritus of engineering at Carleton University. He’s worked as a special consultant on such projects as the Rogers Centre and Aviation Museum.

Some 335 guests attended the dinner, including India’s deputy high commissioner, Narinder Chauhan; Senator Consiglio Di Nino; and parliamentary secretaries Deepak Obhrai and Pierre Poilievre.

Interest in the gala is growing due to strong relations between India and Canada’s governments, said ICOBC’s chairman, Dr. Pradeep Merchant, head of neonatology at The Ottawa Hospital’s Civic campus.