MUMBAI: Music broadcaster MTV has kicked off its initiative MTV Youth Icon of the Year 2005.

Every year, young Indians vote for their favourite Youth Icon among a pantheon of newsmakers, who have fired their imagination all through the year. This time around the nominees for youth icon include Sonia Gandhi, Shah Rukh Khan, Manish Malhotra, Irfan Pathan, Azim Premji and Sonu Nigam.

This year MTV has introduced a new seventh category the Ubharta Sitara. Post her performances on the tennis court, Sania Mirza has zoomed up the popularity charts amongst the youth resulting in her nomination as the Ubharta Sitara. The number of public votes acquired by each one of these seven nominees will decide the final Youth Icon for 2005.

The nominations have been arrived at after a 10-city study conducted by Indian Market Research Bureau (IMRB), India's premier research agency. The sample size included youngsters aged 15 to 24, from various SECs with cable and satellite availability. The youth hailed from the ten cities of Ahmedabad, Chennai, Chandigarh, Hyderabad, Indore, Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, New Delhi and Pune.

Voting can be done online by logging onto www.mtvindia.com. Viewers can also SMS "ICON" to 6882 to vote for their choice or call 1250-122 (BSNL) or 1250-111-122 (MTNL). Voting has begun and will continue till 1 May. The winner will be announced on 10 June.

MTV India MD Alex Kuruvilla said, "There never has been a better time for opportunity and growth for young Indians, but they need role models to shape and inspire them. MTV Youth Icon is a hugely popular platform created for the youth to identify their heroes youth icons like Rahul Dravid (2004) and Anil Ambani (2003). This year too the nomination list is a virtual powerhouse of achievers."

The initiative is presented by Samsung with associate sponsorships from Tata Indica V2, Killer, Nescafe, Haier Color TVs, Castrol 4T and print partner Outlook. The TV partner is Headlines Today, the ground partner is Barista and the radio partner is 93.5 Red FM.