King’s Birthday Honours 2026
Ten Australians of Indian origin feature in the King’s Birthday Honours (2026) list, with recipients recognised across a range of medal categories. These include an AO, an AM, and eight OAMs, spanning medicine, mental health, tech, and decades of quiet, sustained community service.
Topping the list is a woman, continuing a trend that has become something of a hallmark in recent years.
Professor Valsamma Eapen of UNSW has been recognised with an AO, one of the most distinguished honours, awarded for service of a high degree to Australia or to humanity at large. Scientia Professor of Infant, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at UNSW since 2008, Professor Eapen has spent over three decades at the intersection of neurodevelopmental research and clinical care. As Head of the Academic Unit of Child Psychiatry at South West Sydney Local Health District, she has shaped national guidelines on autism assessment and ADHD, while also serving on the World Psychiatric Association’s board. Her AO places her in a select cohort of Indian-origin Australians recognised at this level.
Recognised with an AM is Professor Balasubramaniam Venkatesh, an intensivist whose career has defined the landscape of critical care medicine in Australia and beyond. A past president of the College of Intensive Care Medicine of Australia and New Zealand, Professor Venkatesh has led Queensland’s Sepsis Program, held professorial appointments at the University of Queensland and UNSW, and helped establish intensive care training infrastructure in India in the early 2000s. His AM recognises significant service to critical and intensive care medicine, infection control, and tertiary education.
Among this year’s OAM recipients are individuals whose contributions span clinical medicine, community organising, and the arts.
Dr Dilipkumar Gahankari of the Gold Coast has spent two decades leading pro bono reconstructive and cleft surgery missions to tribal communities in Maharashtra through the Melghat Tribal Healthcare Initiative, a commitment that has taken him across borders and, in 2002, to the emergency surgical response following the Bali bombings. His OAM is for service to plastic and reconstructive surgery, though the citation barely captures the human scale of what he has built.
Dr Abhishek Kumar Verma of Melbourne brings a different kind of public commitment to the honours list. A general practitioner serving refugee, migrant, and First Nations communities, Dr Verma also chairs the Victorian Medical Board and has held director roles at Alfred Health and multiple rural hospitals. His has been a career that moves fluidly between the consulting room and the boardroom, each informing the other. He was named RACGP General Practitioner of the Year in 2022.
Bijinder Dugal of Sydney has spent years building AASHA Australia Foundation into a lifeline for elderly Indians navigating the Australian system, running active ageing programs, dementia awareness workshops, and elder rights education across Sydney. A former assistant principal with NSW Education, she has also taught Hindi for over fifteen years. For the Indian diaspora, particularly its older generation, hers is the kind of work that rarely makes news but changes lives daily.
Usha Kiran Chandra of Brisbane brings similar tenacity to Queensland’s multicultural civic landscape.
Dr Atul Kumar Garg of Perth and Saurabh Mishra of Melbourne round out the list, each recognised for service to the community through a range of organisations. Dr Garg’s decades-long dedication spans the Hindu Association of Western Australia, the Federation of Indian Associations of WA (which he founded), and a distinguished record with Neighbourhood Watch. Mr Mishra has had a string of achievements to his name, with innovations in health tech, healthcare, palliative care, ed tech, and classical Indian music.
Representing the Indian community of Victoria, Chethicad Oommen Thomas, founding president of the Malayalee Association of Victoria in 1976 and played a role in the Australia India Society of Victoria AISV, but perhaps his lasting contribution will be in bringing the Indian Orthodox Church to Victoria.
Noshir Irani of Sydney has given service to the community through the Australian Zoroastrian Association, where he served as president across multiple terms, and through Justice of the Peace work and volunteering at Meals on Wheels, delivering meals for elderly residents for nearly two decades.
These stories may span generations and professions, but they share a common thread: a commitment to making Australia a stronger, kinder and more vibrant place.
948 Australians will be receiving King’s Birthday Honours 2026 across various medal categories. Of these 702 recipients are in the General Division of the Order of Australia, including 5 AC, 40 AO, 183 AM and 474 OAM.
34 awards were announced in the Military Division of the Order of Australia, including 3 AO, 11 AM and 20 OAM.
149 Meritorious awards and 63 Conspicuous awards were also announced.
Recipients will be invested with their awards in coming months, at Government House in Canberra or through the respective State Governors.
Read more: Prof. Valsamma Eapen AO: King’s Birthday Honours 2026
