CNN-News18 has announced nominees in four categories for the 16th edition of its Indian of the Year 2026 awards. The categories are Business, Global Indian, Iconic Woman Achiever and Climate Warrior. This year’s theme is ‘The Ones Defining Tomorrow’.

According to a CNN-News18 press release today, the awards recognise Indians whose achievements in 2026 have made an impact in India and across the world. Public voting is now open.

In the Business category, nominees include Uday Kotak, founder and director of Kotak Mahindra Bank, who received the Padma Bhushan in January 2026 and was appointed chairman of Gujarat International Finance Tec-City Company Limited.

Kunal Shah, appointed global head of WhatsApp by Meta in June 2026, is also nominated. Mukund Jha and Madhav Jha, co-founders of AI platform Emergent, are among the nominees after the company raised $130 million in Series C funding at a $1.5 billion valuation.

Other nominees include Peyush Bansal, co-founder of Lenskart, and Vaishali Nigam Sinha, co-founder of ReNew, who reached No. 28 on Fortune India’s 100 Most Powerful Women 2026 list.

The Global Indian category features actor Priyanka Chopra Jonas, who is set to lead Amazon MGM Studios’ film ‘The Bluff’ and headlined the 23rd India Conference at Harvard University.

Chef Vikas Khanna is also nominated for promoting Indian cuisine globally through his New York restaurant Bungalow, which was shortlisted for the James Beard Awards 2026.

Fashion designer Gaurav Gupta, whose design was worn by Shakira during her Madrid tour residency, is another nominee. Kunal Shah and Harvard Business School Dean Srikant M. Datar, who presided over the institution’s 116th commencement in May 2026, are also included in this category.

In the Iconic Woman Achiever category, Squadron Leader Bhawana Kanth has been nominated after becoming the first woman officer in the Indian Air Force to clear the Fighter Combat Leader course in August 2026.

Ultrarunner Sufiya Sufi is also nominated after completing the 480-km Manali-Leh route in 98 hours and 27 minutes, breaking her own Guinness World Record. She later began a 5,000-km ‘Run for Dreams’ journey across 11 states.

Other nominees include Kavitha Subramanian, co-founder of Upstox; chef Garima Arora, whose restaurant has two Michelin stars; and racing driver Diana Pundole, the first Indian woman to compete in the Ferrari Club Challenge Middle East.

The Climate Warrior category recognises people working to protect the environment. Nominees include Sumer Singh Bhati, a traditional camel herder from Jaisalmer who works to conserve nearly 10,000 hectares of grasslands in the Thar Desert.

Surendra Singh Choudhary, also known as Bittu Tabahi, has gained attention for cleanup campaigns around the Ajnar river in Madhya Pradesh, Turahalli forest near Bengaluru and the Yamuna river in Delhi.

Bijiyashanti Tongbram is nominated for her lotus-stem textile initiative from Manipur’s Loktak Lake, which was showcased in Paris.

The other nominees are Pooja Pal, a 17-year-old from Uttar Pradesh who received the Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar for inventing a machine to reduce agricultural dust, and Sharanya Mehta, a 17-year-old who developed a smart irrigation app to address water scarcity in rural Rajasthan.