Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'Let the most deserving get the highest award' that was published in Newsband

Let the most deserving get the highest award

The highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, has been conferred on former Indian Prime Minister A. B. Vajpayee and Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya, the founder of the Banaras Hindu University.

It is strongly felt by many that whosoever has shown or carved out a new path benefiting our countrymen and which is exemplary, and not just the politicians, should be honoured with such an award. These awards represent the pride of our nation. So it is a very definite thing to consider the person's (to be awarded) contribution to the society in and out. There are many great Legends still not properly honored for their priceless service to our society. It is the duty of the center to do justice in this matter.

An award will have respect only when those who receive deserve it and those who give have credibility. Similarly, when you select an awardee purely for political reasons, like selecting Tendulkar, leaving aside much more deserved, the award soon loses its respect.

Yes, there is no doubt that each political party promotes its own candidates which mars the importance of this highest civilian award. Frankly speaking, there should be a committee that decides on these awards, on the basis of an individual's contribution to a particular field rather than his popularity or religious or political leaning.

Last year, UPA hastily conferred BRA on Tendulkar, ignoring the legendary Dhyan Chand and another sporting king, Vishwanath Anand. Individual achievements in team sports are less spectacular than that in solo sports like chess, swimming, shooting etc. Hence, V. Anand deserved BRA this year but has been ignored again.

There can be differences between the opinions of people of India and their representatives in Parliament. It is important to consider what people want and to whom they wish to confer this award. So, in addition to political consensus, there is should be public mandate also for conferring this great national award.

The system of selecting the BRA recipients needs to be changed. Politicians should be kept out of it and a committee consisting of three or five living Bharath Ratnas should select the future recipients, to make it less controversial. Mahatma Gandhi should have been the first recipient of BRA. Instead, the Govt. decided to immortalize MKG by printing his photo on currency notes. The Nobel Peace Prize and BRA have lost some lustre as they had not been given to the Yuga Purush.

There is a degree of absurdity connected with all these Awards. Hand-picking just a few eminent persons for their past deeds, exposes the very intention of the awards. The awards might have some meaning and purpose if some extraordinary current / contemporary feat is recognised instantly. The longer the list of award winners of our highest National award (Bharat Ratna) grows, the importance of the award becomes lesser, insignificant and more contentious.