Narendra Modi government may announce a Bharat Ratna to Atal Bihari Vajpayee on his 90th birthday

NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi government may announce a Bharat Ratna for former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on his 90th birthday on December 25.

Two government functionaries — a senior minister and a bureaucrat — have told ET that the first Bharat Ratna by the Modi government will be bestowed upon BJP’s first prime minister. “There is an in-principle agreement over this...what the government is looking for is an occasion. The announcement may well come on Vajpayeeji’s 90th Birthday on December 25,” the minister said on condition of anonymity as the final decision would be of the PM.

As per the babu, the convention is that the Bharat Ratna is announced around the Republic Day. “The first B-Ratna of this government will be for Vajpayee,” the person said.

Last year, when UPA announced Bharat Ratna for cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and scientist CNR Rao, BJP had criticised UPA for ignoring Vajpayee and had announced that it would bestow the nation’s highest civilian award on him as soon as it forms a government.

The minister cited above said the previous BJP-led NDA government also always announced Bharat Ratna around the Republic Day and not the Independence Day. “So there was never a move to announce a Bharat Ratna on this Independence Day,” he said. The NDA government announced Bharat Ratna for Lata Mangeshkar and Ustad Bismillah Khan on January 25, 2001, for Amartya Sen on January 18, 1999, for Pandit Ravi Shankar and Gopinath Bordoloi on January 30, 1999 and for Jayaprakash Narayan in December 1998.