| | | BharatRatna - Highest civilian award |
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kriti
Veteran
Posts: 129
 
 |  Posted 2010-02-26 10:30 PM
Subject: Bharat Ratna - Highest civilian award
Bharat Ratna - Highest civilian award
Bharat Ratna is India's highest civilian award, awarded for the highest degrees of national service. This service includes artistic, literary, and scientific achievements, as well as "recognition of public service of the highest order.Unlike knights, holders of the Bharat Ratna carry no special title nor any other honorifics, but they do have a place in the Indian order of precedence.
The award was established by the first President of India, Rajendra Prasad, on 2 January 1954. Along with other major national honours, such as the Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri, the awarding of the Bharat Ratna was suspended from 13 July 1977 to 26 January 1980.
The honour has been awarded to forty one people, a list which includes two non-Indians and a naturalized Indian citizen. Originally, the specifications for the award called for a circular gold medal carrying the state emblem and motto, among other things. It is uncertain if a design in accordance with the original specifications was ever made. The actual award is designed in the shape of a peepul leaf and carries with the words "Bharat Ratna", inscribed in Devanagari script. The reverse side of the medal carries the state emblem and motto. The award is attached to a two-inch wide ribbon, and was designed to be worn around the recipient's neck.
Edited by kriti 2010-02-26 10:31 PM
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kriti
Veteran
Posts: 129
| Posted 2010-02-26 10:34 PM
Subject: RE: Bharat Ratna - Highest civilian award
History
The order was established by Rajendra Prasad, President of India, on 2 January 1954. The original statutes of January 1954 did not make allowance for posthumous awards (and this perhaps explains why the decoration was never awarded to Mahatma Gandhi), though this provision was added in the January 1955 statute. Subsequently, there have been twelve posthumous awards, including the award to Subhash Chandra Bose in 1992, which was later withdrawn due to a legal technicality, the only case of an award being withdrawn. The award was briefly suspended from 13 July 1977 to 26 January 1980.
While there was no formal provision that recipients of the Bharat Ratna should be Indian citizens, this seems to have been the general assumption. There has been one award to a naturalized Indian citizen, Mother Teresa (1980), and two to non-Indians, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan (1987) and Nelson Mandela (1990). The awarding of this honor though, has frequently been the subject of litigation questioning the constitutional basis of such.
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kriti
Veteran
Posts: 129
| Posted 2010-02-26 11:00 PM
Subject: RE: Bharat Ratna - Highest civilian award
1. C. Rajagopalachari Last Governor-General, independence activist.
2. C. V. Raman Nobel-prize winning Physicist
3. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan Second President, First Vice President,
4. Bhagwan Das Literature, independence activist
5. Mokshagundam Visvesvarayya Civil Engineer, Dam Architect, Diwan of Princely
6. Jawaharlal Nehru First Prime Minister, independence activist,
7. Govind Ballabh Pant Independence activist, Home Minister
8. Dhondo Keshav Karve Educationist, Social Reformer, Awarded in his birth centenary year.
9. Bidhan Chandra Roy Physician, Politician, Former Chief Minister of West Bengal
10. Purushottam Das Tandon Independence activist, Educationist
11. Rajendra Prasad First President, independence activist, Jurist
12. Zakir Hussain Former President, Scholar.
13. Pandurang Vaman Kane Indologist and Sanskrit scholar
14. Lal Bahadur Shastri Posthumous, Second Prime Minister, independence activist
15. Indira Gandhi Former Prime Minister
16. V. V. Giri Former President, Trade Unionist.
17. K. Kamaraj Posthumous, independence activist
18. Agnesë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu
(Mother Teresa) Nobel Laureate (Peace, 1979).
19. Vinoba Bhave Posthumous, Social Reformer, independence activist.
20. Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan First non-citizen, independence activist.
21. M. G. Ramachandran Posthumous, Chief Minister-Tamil Nadu, Actor.
22. B. R. Ambedkar Posthumous, Architect-Indian Constitution,Social Reformer, Economist and Scholar
23. Nelson Mandela Second non-citizen and first non-Indian, Leader of Anti-Apartheid movement.
24. Rajiv Gandhi Posthumous, Former Prime Minister
25. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Posthumous, independence activist, First Home Minister of India.
26. Morarji Desai Former Prime Minister, independence activist.
27. Abul Kalam Azad Posthumous, independence activist, First Education Minister of India
28. J. R. D. Tata Industrialist and philanthropist
29. Satyajit Ray Film director
30. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam Former President, scientist. Tamil Nadu
31. Gulzarilal Nanda Independence activist, former Prime Minister. Punjab
32. Aruna Asaf Ali Posthumous, independence activist. West Bengal
33. M. S. Subbulakshmi Carnatic music vocalist. Tamil Nadu
34. Chidambaram Subramaniam Independence activist, Minister of Agriculture.
35. Jayaprakash Narayan Posthumous, independence activist, Social Reformer.
36. Ravi Shankar Sitar player
37. Amartya Sen Nobel-prize winning Economist
38. Gopinath Bordoloi Posthumous, independence activist, Chief Minister Assam
39. Lata Mangeshkar Singer Maharashtra
40. Bismillah Khan Classical musician, shehnai maestro
41. Bhimsen Joshi Hindustani Classical vocalist
Edited by kriti 2010-02-26 11:14 PM
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