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Owaisi’s shocking comment on Bharat Ratna!

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At an event in Maharashtra yesterday, All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Assaduddin Owaisi while talking about the highest civilian award in the country says, “Tell me, how many Bharat Ratna Awards have been conferred to Dalits, Adivasis, poor, Muslims, upper cast or Brahmins. The Bharat Ratna conferred to Babasaheb Ambedkar was given not willingly but out of compulsion!

Last September, Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul Muslimeen (AIMIM) forged an alliance with Dr Ambedkar’s grandson for the upcoming national elections and the Maharashtra assembly elections later this year. Prakash Ambedkar is the head of the Bharipa Bahujan Mahasangh.

As this year Bharat Ratna was conferred to former President Pranab Mukherji by government as country’s highest civilian honor, social activist and one of the BJP’s senior-most leaders Nanji Deshmukh and music maestro from Assam, Bhupen Hazarika, have been awarded subsequently as well.

As the chief of AIMIM passed the statement, Telanghana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) backed Owaisi’s comments and said, “ It is a apposite question been raised for betterment underpriviledged communities and against the discrimination they are facing.” The party further brought to notice that the statement should not be taken as a communal but rather should be carefully considered.

Bharat Ratna Award Winners

S.No. Name of the Awardees Year
1 Shri C. Rajagopalachari 1954
2 Dr.Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan 1954
3 Dr.C. V. Raman 1954
4 Dr.Bhagwan Das 1955
5 Dr.M Visvesvaraya 1955
6 Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru 1955
7 Pt. Govind Ballabh Pant 1957
8 Dr.Dhondo Keshav Karve 1958
9 Dr.Bidhan Chandra Roy 1961
10 Shri.Purushottam Das Tandon 1961
11 Dr.Rajendra Prasad 1962
12 Dr.Zakir Husain 1962
13 Dr.Pandurang Vaman Kane 1963
14 Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri (posthumous) 1966
15 Smt.Indira Gandhi 1971
16 Shri V. V. Giri 1975
17 Shri K. Kamaraj(posthumous) 1976
18 Mother Teresa 1980
19 Shri Acharya Vinoba Bhave 1983
20 Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan 1987
21 Shri M. G. Ramachandran 1988
22 Dr.B. R. Ambedkar 1990
23 Nelson Mandela 1990
24 Shri.Rajiv Gandhi (posthumous) 1991
25 Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (posthumous) 1991
26 Shri Morarji Desai 1991
27 Maulana Abul Kalam Azad (posthumous) 1992
28 Shri J. R. D. Tata 1992
29 Shri Satyajit Ray 1992
30 Shri Gulzarilal Nanda 1997
31 Smt.Aruna Asaf Ali(posthumous) 1997
32 Dr.A. P. J. Abdul Kalam 1997
33 Smt.M. S. Subbulakshmi 1998
34 Shri Chidambaram Subramaniam 1998
35 Loknayak Jayaprakash Narayan (posthumous) 1999
36 Professor Amartya Sen 1999
37 Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi (posthumous) 1999
38 Pandit Ravi Shankar 1999
39 ShushriLata Mangeshkar 2001
40 Ustad Bismillah Khan 2001
41 Pandit Bhimsen Joshi 2009
42 Professor C. N. R. Rao 2014
43 Shri Sachin Tendulkar 2014
44 Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya (posthumous) 2015
45 Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee 2015
46 Pranab Mukherjee 2019
47 Bhupen Hazarika 2019
48 Nanaji Deshmukh 2019

Out of the 48 Bharat Ratna Awards conferred from 1954 to 2019, there are approximately six Muslims and 2 dalits have received Bharat Ratna till now.

JP MLA Raja Singh asked Asaduddin Owaisi to learn history before speaking, after the AIMIM chief made controversial remarks about the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian award. The BJP’s Raja Singh asked if Owaisi was upset because his father or he hadn’t received the award, and said he would never do so. The AIMIM wanted to leave India at the time of division, the MLA said.

While the INC and Janata Party was in power, there were nearly 5 Muslims awarded with Bharat Ratna and while BJP sworn in 1998, Bharat Ratna was conferred to Ustad Bismillah Khan in 2001.