WWE News: Jinder Mahal presented with Heroes Behind The Heroes award

What's the story?

Sony Yay of Sony Pictures Sports Network, WWE's broadcast partner in India, has conferred an award on Indian origin WWE Superstar Jinder Mahal.

Mahal took to his twitter account to break the news to his fans, saying that he was honoured and humbled to accept the award.

In case you didn’t know…

The 'Heroes Behind The Heroes' award was started by Sony Yay last year as a Teachers Day initiative, which is celebrated on September 5th annually in India. Tennis player Sania Mirza, Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi, filmmaker Subhash Ghai among others were conferred the award in 2017.

Jinder Mahal, real name Yuvraj Singh Dhesi, is a second generation wrestler after his uncle Gama Singh, and is currently signed to WWE's Raw brand. Starting off in FCW back in 2011, Mahal reached the zenith of his career last year when he became the WWE Champion at Backlash 2017.

The heart of the matter

After his incredible physical transformation, The Modern Day Maharaja received a huge push last year, and became the number one contender for the WWE Championship on an episode of SmackDown Live last year.

He went on to win the Championship from Randy Orton at Backlash. After an impressive 170-day reign with the title, he ended up dropping it to AJ Styles on an episode of SmackDown Live. In the Superstar Shake-up 2018, he was drafted to the red brand, and has stayed on in Raw ever since.

Though his Championship run was not very well received by the fans, The Maharaja continues to enjoy quite a fan following back in India, which was very apparent during WWE's tour of India earlier this year when he received a thunderous ovation from the New Delhi crowd.

Sony Yay announced their decision to confer Mahal with the award earlier today with a tweet:

There are some #HeroesBehindTheHeroes who we don't just love, but also truly admire & respect for their courage & belief. One such hero is @JinderMahal.Just like him, who are the heroes in your life, who have given you strength & belief to do more? Go on, tell us! pic.twitter.com/N31SJj0f90

— Sony YAY! (@SonyYAY) October 9, 2018

Mahal took to his own twitter to state that he was honoured to be receiving the award and asserted that he hopes to continue being a positive influence on the youth of India.

Incredibly humbled and honored to accept this @sonyyay. I hope I will continue to be a positive influence on the youth of India. @WWEIndia #HeroesBehindTheHeroes pic.twitter.com/PYZJKznvxs

— The Maharaja (@JinderMahal) October 9, 2018

What's next?

It looks like Mahal is now returning to his old Man of Peace gimmick, and is enjoying a mid card run on Raw. He is one half of the team 'Mahalicia' in the second edition of Mixed Match Challenge along with Alicia Fox.

The duo ended up losing to the team of Finn Balor and Bayley once on MMC, as well as this past week on Raw.

What are your thoughts on the award given to Mahal? Have your say in the comments.