Sutar, who turned 100 last month, is a Padma Bhushan awardee and has designed the Statue of Unity which is the world’s tallest statue with a height of 182 metres.
Fadnavis said the decision to honour Sutar with the highest civilian award of the state was taken unanimously by a committee headed by him on March 12.
“He is a centenarian but is still working on the Ambedkar statue at the Indu mill memorial project in Mumbai,” he said.
The award comprises Rs 25 lakh and a memento. Sutar, who works with his son Anil, has been associated with many major projects like the Statue of Unity, the 251-metre tall statue of Lord Ram at Ayodhya, 153-feet high statue of Lord Shiva in Bengaluru and a 100-feet tall statue of Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj at Moshi in Pune.
Last year, four months after a 35-feet tall statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj collapsed at Rajkot fort in Malvan in Maharashtra’s Sindhudurg district, triggering a massive political slugfest in the state, the Maharashtra government awarded the contract of building a new 60-feet statue of the Maratha warrior king at the fort to Sutar’s firm Ram Sutar Art Creations Pvt Ltd that built the ‘Statue of Unity’ in Gujarat.