In a little over two weeks’ time the great and the good will rub shoulders with some of Bradford’s finest community volunteers in the ritzy finale to our Bradford’s Best awards.

November 28th is the date, and those short-listed for the 11 award categories should, any time now, be hearing the slap of the invitations to this wonderful event on their doormats.

We asked readers to nominate people, groups or firms in the following ten categories:

* Best Community Project

* Best Community Group

* Best Citizen – two categories, Community and Public

* Best Community Project for Disabled

* Best School Community Project

* Best Neighbour

* Best Community Business Contribution

* Best Future Citizen

* Best Community Sports Contribution

* Best Community Environmental Project

The hope was that readers would highlight the fantastic work that is constantly going on at grassroots level across the district – and we weren’t disappointed.

By the closing date of October 31 we had a bulging mailbag with your nominations… and then the hard work really started.

Because there were so many wonderful, emotional and inspirational stories that it was an extremely tough job to choose between them.

Our panel of judges has been meeting over the past couple of weeks trying to whittle down the entries in each category to a shortlist of just three nominations for each award. There have been arguments, disagreements and sometimes sulks, but using a scoring method to make the procedure as scientific as possible we managed to complete the task.

We wish we could have given an award to everyone who was nominated, but it sadly isn’t possible.

But we’ve been often surprised and sometimes moved by the eloquence with which you, our readers, have put forward your nominations for the Bradford’s Best awards.

To those who didn’t make the shortlist, all we can say is that it was a very, very close run thing in every single category, and we salute you for your work in whichever field you were nominated.

As to the shortlisted entries… well, that’s remaining a secret just for a little longer, but we’ll be profiling every single one of the three nominated entries in each of the categories just ahead of the event on November 28.

And to the event itself… our venue is one of Bradford’s brightest and newest, the Midpoint Suite in Thornbury. It’s the latest venture from the city’s Aagrah restaurant group, a £4 million project that opened earlier this year.

It is set in 1.6 acres in the Gallagher Leisure Park on the borders of Leeds and Bradford, and the striking and elegant development provides a new home for the Aagrah’s famous elephant mascot, Lulu.

We are anticipating a full house, with the nominees and their guests, representatives of the companies and organisations who have kindly sponsored the awards, and members from Bradford’s business and public life communities who want to come along to applaud the best of Bradford.

Old and young, individuals and groups, businesses and voluntary organisations, our shortlisted nominees will be treated to the best cuisine the Aagrah chefs can dish up.

Entertainment will be provided by Stage 84, the successful Bradford youth theatre group. Stage 84 this year celebrated its 25th anniversary, and over its lifetime it has produced young performers who have gone on to great things – Jack P Shepherd and Nikki Patel, who both star in Coronation Street, West End star Emma Williams, and Girls Aloud singer Kimberley Walsh.

The current crop of talented youngsters will treat the guests on November 28 to a medley of tunes from the hit Disney series of movies High School Musical.

Our journalists have been busy profiling the nominated entrants, both for print and, in this multimedia age, on video. The evening will be overseen by the Telegraph & Argus editor Perry Austin-Clarke, who will announce each category and a short film on the work of each shortlisted nominee.

His co-compere for the night will be TV and radio personality Debbie Lindley. Debbie, who has her own weekend show on Real Radio, is a former TV weather presenter and also did a stint as a popular columnist for the T&A.

Of course, this isn’t the first time the T&A has organised community awards of this nature. It is ten years since our first Bradford’s Best event, then dubbed the Millennium Awards, and anyone who remembers that glittering night will know that those due to attend two weeks’ tomorrow are in for a treat.

On the night, the winners in each individual category will receive £500, while group winners will get £1,000.

But the financial reward is just the icing on the cake, of course.

What really matters is that those often-unsung heroes who are content to soldier on in the background, doing good for others without any demands for rewards or publicity, are given their moment in the spotlight just for one night. We hope you’ll agree when you read the report of the event on the following Monday that the panel of judges made the right choices, as difficult as they were.

If you don’t, then remember that although there can only be one winner in each category, there aren’t really any losers. Those who have been nominated, even if they didn’t make the shortlist, can rest assured that they have the greatest prize of all – the admiration and gratitude of those who live near them, work alongside them or benefit from their good work.

And that’s what Bradford’s Best is all about – recognising those who do good and maybe, just maybe, inspiring others to do the same.

Because if we all did just a fraction of the good that all those nominated have done, just imagine what an even more wonderful place Bradford would be.