Asian professionals celebrated at Signature Awards

THE Signature Awards celebrated the strength of Asian professionals within the region in front of a capacity audience at Edgbaston Stadium.

The awards are the brainchild of Black Country Chamber of Commerce president Ninder Johal and returned for a second year on Friday night,

More than 460 people were in attendance to see the Lifetime Achievement given to Sewa Singh Mandla, who famously challenged a decision by a Birmingham head teacher to ban a student – Mr Mandla’s son, Gurinder – from wearing a turban.

The fight went all the way to the House of Lords (having generated a particularly dated view of discrimination from the Master of the Rolls, Lord Denning, in the Court of Appeal) where the court found that Sikhs were a racial or ethnic group, and therefore came under the protection of the Race Relations Act 1976.

Click here to view the photos from the 2016 Signature Awards

The other award winners were:

Excellence in Finance: Chan Nandhray, West Bromwich Building Society

Excellence in Law: Anurag Singh, Gowling WLG

Excellence in Banking: Rav Bagri, Santander Bank

Young Professional of the Year: Jatinder Paul, Irwin Mitchell

Excellence in Business: Shahid Sheikh, Clifton Packaging

Excellence in Professions for Owner Practice: Ranjit Thaliwal, Thaliwal & Co Solicitors

Diversity Award: PEL Solicitors

Nachural founder Mr Johal spoke about the positive growth of the UK over the last 12 months but warned about the slowing down of the global economy and in particular the problems surrounding the Eurozone.

He also warned the region to collaborate and work together in order to safeguard funding for crucial issues such as transport infrastructure and local skills development.

Lovebrum was the charity on the night, with £2,500 raised. A further £4,000 was donated by guest speaker Paul Bassi on behalf of his restaurant Asha’s.

Host for the evening was Tommy Sandhu, a BBC presenter and the entertainment was produced by Gabhru Panjab De. The award sponsors were Birmingham City University, Brit Asia, BSJ Fixings, Cobra Beer, Divya Group, East End Foods, Hollywood Monster, Pathway Group, Rational FX, TheBusinessDesk.com, Vision and Wolverhampton University.

Click here to view the photos from the 2016 Signature Awards

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