Prime Minister A B Vajpayee will confer the honour on actor Naseeruddin Shah, ghazal maestro Jagjit Singh, filmmaker Gulzar and versatile singer actress Suraiyya at a function to be held at the Vigyan Bhavan here on Sunday.

According to K Satchidanandan, Secretary, Sahitya Akademi, the function is being held as part of the celebrations organised by the Akademi on the occasion of bi-centenary of the poet.

Gulzar, Jagjit Singh and Naseeruddin Shah are honoured for their involvement in the popular TV serial Mirza Ghalib on the life and works of the poet. Suraiiya had acted as a courtesan in the film Ghalib in which Bharat Bhushan had played the lead role.

The serial, produced by Gulzar, became highly popular across the country and had several re-runs since it was first telecast in 1988.Jagjit Singh sang the poems of Ghalib and wasalso the music director of the serial while Naseeruddin Shah played the role of the poet. The Prime Minister will also inaugurate an international seminar on `Ghalib's world, times, ideas and contemporaries' on the occasion.Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi will release a postal envolve, `First Day Ghalib Cover', which will have a picture of Ghalib, a special seal and a few lines from his poetry.

Satchidanandan said the main emphasis of the three-day seminar will be on the response of other Indian languages such as Hindi, Bengali, Malayalam, Kannada and Gujarati to Ghalib's poetry.

Noted writers from these languages will discuss how the poet is received in their languages. Scholars from France, Russia, the Slovak Republic, Japan and Germany will present papers on the international scenario of Ghalib studies.

Prominent among the participants are Jnanpith awardees Gurratulain Hyder and Ali Sardar Jafri. The academic sessions of the seminar will be held at the India InternationalCentre on December 14 and 15.

Qaid-e-hayat, an Urdu play written by Surendra verma based on the life and works of the poet will be presented by the students of the National School of Drama (NSD) on December 14.

The play, directed by NSD director Ram Gopal Bajaj, will be staged at the Sri Ram Centre at 7 pm. There will also be a mushaira on the concluding day at 6.30 pm in which former prime minister Inder Kumar Gujral will be the chief guest.