Father of White Revolution, Verghese Kurien receives maximum recomendations for Bharat Ratna

NEW DELHI: India’s ' Milkman', the late VergheseKurien, was not considered worthy of being conferred the BharatRatna, despite the government receiving nearly two dozen petitions urging it to bestow him the highest honour this year.

Petitions in favour of Kurien, the winner of the World Food Prize and the Magsaysay Award and celebrated around the world for his contributions in making India self sufficient in milk and edible oil, even topped those for cricketer Sachin Tendulkar, the Prime Minister’s Office disclosed in response to ET’s RTI query.

"A decision was taken to not award the Bharat Ratna to any person this year," PMO spokesman Pankaj Pachauri said.

UPA has been extremely parsimonious on conferring the Bharat Ratna: The last one went to Pandit Bhimsen Joshi, in 2008. In 2012 or 2013, no meetings were held to discuss the nominations.

A government official involved with the Bharat Ratna award said it was a discretionary honour and it was not mandatory to confer it each year. This official said the PMO typically receives nominations of several eminent names each year and its decision not to bestow the award had nothing to do with the capability or eminence of the persons recommended.

Kurien’s daughter Nirmala Kurien expressed surprise that many people had recommended her father’s name, and said she was disappointed that her father was not given the award.

"My father was a great patriot... He worked for the country and only the country. But the government in its wisdom chose not to
honour him with the Bharat Ratna," she told ET on phone from Chennai.

"In fact, it would have been much better if the government had honoured my father with the Bharat Ratna in his lifetime. I don’t think anything would have pleased him more after the great service he did for the country.

If he was alive and had received the Bharat Ratna, he would have been the proudest Indian. Why don’t we honour our great Indians with Bharat Ratna while they are alive? My father was alive for 90 years. Still he was ignored," she added.