From Dr Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan To LK Advani: Bharat Ratna Awardees List From 1954 To 2024

BJP stalwart and former deputy prime minister L K Advani will be conferred the Bharat Ratna, the country's highest civilian award.

Bharat Ratna: Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced on Saturday that BJP stalwart and former deputy prime minister L K Advani will be conferred the Bharat Ratna, the country’s highest civilian award. ‘Bharat Ratna’, the highest civilian Award of the country, was instituted in the year 1954. Any person without distinction of race, occupation, position or sex is eligible for these awards. It is awarded in recognition of exceptional service/performance of the highest order in any field of human endeavour.

In terms of Article 18 (1) of the Constitution, the award cannot be used as a prefix or suffix to the recipient’s name. However, should an award winner consider it necessary, he/she may use the following expression in their biodata/letterhead/visiting card etc. to indicate that he/she is a recipient of the award: ‘Awarded Bharat Ratna by the President’ or ‘Recipient of Bharat Ratna Award’. In this article, check the complete list of Bharat Ratna Awardees from 1954 to 2024.

From Dr Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan to LK Advani: Check Complete List of Recipients of Bharat Ratna 

1. Shri Chakravarti Rajagopalachari (1878-1972) 1954
2. Dr. SarvapalliRadhakrishnan (1888-1975) 1954
3. Dr. ChandrasekharaVenkata Raman (1888-1970) 1954
4. Dr. Bhagwan Das (1869-1958) 1955
5. Dr. MokshagundamVisvesvaraya (1861-1962) 1955
6. Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru (1889 -1964) 1955
7. Pt. GovindBallabh Pant (1887-1961) 1957
8. Dr. DhondoKeshavKarve (1858-1962) 1958
9. Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy (1882-1962) 1961
10. Shri Purushottam Das Tandon (1882-1962) 1961
11. Dr. Rajendra Prasad (1884-1963) 1962
12. Dr. Zakir Husain (1897-1969) 1963
13. Dr. PandurangVaman Kane (1880-1972) 1963
14. Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri (Posthumous) (1904-1966) 1966
15. Smt. Indira Gandhi (1917-1984) 1971
16. Shri VarahagiriVenkataGiri (1894-1980) 1975
17. Shri KumaraswamyKamraj (Posthumous) (1903-1975) 1976
18. Mother Mary Teresa Bojaxhiu (Mother Teresa) (1910- 1997) 1980
19. Shri Acharya VinobaBhave (Posthumous) (1895-1982) 1983
20. Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan (1890-1988) 1987
21. Shri MarudurGopalan Ramachandran (Posthumous) (1917-1987) 1988
22. Dr.Bhim Rao RamjiAmbedkar (Posthumous) (1891-1956) 1990
23. Dr. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (1918-2013) 1990
24. Shri Rajiv Gandhi (Posthumous) (1944-1991) 1991
25. SardarVallabhbhai Patel (Posthumous) (1875-1950) 1991
26. Shri MorarjiRanchhodji Desai (1896-1995) 1991
27. MaulanaAbulKalam Azad (Posthumous) (1888-1958) 1992
28. Shri JehangirRatanjiDadabhai Tata (1904-1993) 1992
29. Shri Satyajit Ray (1922-1992) 1992
30. Shri Gulzarilal Nanda (1898-1998) 1997
31. Smt. ArunaAsaf Ali (Posthumous) (1909-1996) 1997
32. Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam (1931-2015) 1997
33. Smt. Madurai ShanmukhavadivuSubbulakshmi (1916- 2005) 1998
34. Shri Chidambaram Subramaniam (1910-2000) 1998
35. Shri Jayaprakash Narayan (Posthumous) (1902-1979) 1999
36. Professor Amartya Sen (b-1933) 1999
37. LokpriyaGopinathBordoloi (Posthumous) (1890-1950) 1999
38. Pandit Ravi Shankar (1920-2012) 1999
39. SushriLataDinanathMangeshkar (b-1929) 2001
40. UstadBismillah Khan (1916-2006) 2001
41. PanditBhimsenGururaj Joshi (1922-2011) 2009
42. Prof. C. N. R. Rao (b-1934) 2014
43. Shri Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar(b-1973) 2014
44. Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee (1924-2018) 2015
45. Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya (Posthumous)(1861-1946) 2015
46. Shri NanajiDeshmukh (Posthumous)(1916-2010) 2019
47. Dr. Bhupendra Kumar Hazarika (Posthumous)(1926-2011) 2019
48. Shri Pranab Mukherjee (b-1935) 2019
49. Karpoori Thakur (Posthumous) (1924-1988)
50. L K Advani(2024)

Taking to X, Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrote, “I am very happy to share that Shri LK Advani Ji will be conferred the Bharat Ratna. I also spoke to him and congratulated him on being conferred this honour. One of the most respected statesmen of our times, his contribution to the development of India is monumental. His is a life that started from working at the grassroots to serving the nation as our Deputy Prime Minister. He distinguished himself as our Home Minister and I&B Minister as well. His Parliamentary interventions have always been exemplary, full of rich insights.”