The BBC's head of the New Media & Technology division, Sharmila Nebhrajani, is among nominees for the annual Asian Women of Achievement awards to be held next week.

The prestigious event seeks to applaud and celebrate the "commitment, dedication and determination of Asian women to their professional and personal achievements" within different industry sectors. There are six finalists this year competing for the Media award.

Ms Nebhrajani started her career as an accountant after a Masters from Oxford and went on to join Coopers & Lybrand (now PWC) where she advised on business issues. She joined the BBC as senior strategy advisor in 1996 and became head of corporate planning a year later.

She is currently responsible for the operational management, financial and business strategy, risk management and internal control of the BBC's New Media & Technology division. She also overlooks commercial exploitation of the corporation's technical and editorial intellectual property.

The youngest nominee on the list is 27 year-old freelance journalist Wersha Bharadwa who frequently writes for women's lifestyle and fashion magazines.

An agony aunt of sorts, she has appeared several times on Asian Network to help listeners solve relationship problems and been interviewed on talk shows and news programmes to commentate on everything from the size-zero debate to women carrying condoms.

Also nominated is radio presenter Lucky Dhillon who has worked in Asian media for more than 20 years. Moving to London from India at the age of 13, she became a disability social worker after studies despite wanting to pursue a career in singing.

She later started producing and presenting a daily talk show on Sina Radio, which later became Sunrise Radio in 1989. She left in 1996 to start her own company and produced two original programmes including Amrit Vela for Spectrum Radio, which transmits daily from the Golden Temple. Despite being diagnosed with cancer in 2005 she raised funds to build the first Sikh Gurdwara in Lahore since 1947.

BBC London News presenter Riza Lateef, Met Office's media manager Manali Lukha and BBC Asian Network's editor Vijay Sharma are also nominated.

Ms Lateef joined BBC London News in 2004 and was named the face of London News last year. She presents the flagship 6:30pm half hour programme on BBC One and regional news during the corporation's Ten O'clock News two nights a week.

Manali Lukha has been working for the government's Met Office for 10 years and was recently promoted to manage the Met Office Media Team where she provides weather services to ITV, Channel 4, GMTV, Scottish TV and ITN and presents the weather on the weekends for ITV London.

Vijay Sharma joined BBC Radio Leicester 20 years ago and later progressed to editor of Asian Network after it launched. Ms Sharma's nomination has raised some eyebrows however since the digital radio station is also a media partner to the AWA awards.

Other media professionals in the nominations list include the BBC's Zarin Patel, Akademi's director Mira Kaushik OBE and PR manager Nita Shah

The yearly event was launched by Pinky Lilani and Munir Samji to recognise all levels of achievement made by Asian women in the UK. It counts Cherie Blair QC as one of its patrons.

Winners will be announced on 23rd May at an event in London.


Full list of nominations

The Arts & Culture Award
Tara Kamangar
Mira Kaushik
Sonia Sabri
Anurekha Ghosh
Reena Tailor


The Public Sector Award
Sunaina Mann
Manjula Sood
Perminder Dhillon
Geetha Nagasubramanian
Priti Patel


The Social & Humanitarian Award
Masayo Kidani
Dr Ujwala Samant
Nasima Khan
Seema Malhotra
Simi Chowdhry
Charmaine Jayetilleke MBE


Business Woman of the Year - Corporate
Zarin Patel
Farrah Qureshi
Romana Abdin
Karen Seto
Zahra Kassim-Lakha
Superna Sethi


Entrepreneur of the Year
Yashwanti Amlan MBE
Sital Punja
Sharon Kaur
Mani Kohli
Safia Minney


Media Professional of the Year
Vijay Sharma
Lucky Dhillon
Riz Lateef
Wersha Bharadwa
Manali Lukha
Sharmila Nebharajani


Professional of the Year
Dr Helen Lee
Professor Nazlin Karmali Howell
Professor Zenobia Nadirshaw
Yasmin Qureshi
Dr Haseena Lockhat


Young Achiever of the Year
Kiran Bali JP
Noreen Mirza
Arti Poddar
Kiran Matharu
Ushrat Sultana JP
Nita Shah