Former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and former Congress Party president, noted freedom fighter and educationist Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya will be conferred with the nation's top civilian award -the Bharat Ratna, the office of President Pranab Mukherjee said on Tuesday.
A communique issued by the president's office said, "The President has been pleased to award Bharat Ratna to Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya (posthumously) and to Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee."
Vajpayee will get the award as he enters his 91st year on Thursday.
Born on December 25,1924, Vajpayee was the eleventh Prime Minister of India, first for 13 days in 1996 and then from 1998 to 2004.
A leader of the centre-right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he was the first Prime Minister from outside the Indian National Congress party to serve a full five-year term.
A parliamentarian for over four decades, Vajpayee was elected to the Lok Sabha nine times, and twice to the Rajya Sabha.
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He also served as the Member of Parliament for Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, until 2009, when he retired from active politics due to poor health.
Vajpayee was one amongst the founder members of erstwhile Bharatiya Jana Sangh, which he had also headed.
He was also the Minister of External Affairs in the cabinet of Morarji Desai. When Janata government collapsed, Vajpayee restarted the Jana Sangh as the Bharatiya Janata Party in 1980.
Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya (1861-1946) will be conferred the Bharat Ratna posthumously on the occasion of his 153rd birth anniversary.
He was an educationist and politician notable for his role in the Indian independence movement and his espousal of Hindu nationalism. He was one of the initial leaders of the far-right party Hindu Mahasabha). Later in life, he was also addressed as 'Mahamana'.
He was the President of the Indian National Congress on two occasions (1909 and 1918) and today is most remembered as the founder of the Banaras Hindu University (BHU), the largest residential university in Asia and one of the largest in the world, having over 12,000 students across arts, sciences, engineering and technology at Varanasi in 1916.
He was the university's vice chancellor between 1919 and 1938.
Malviya was one of the founders of Scouting in India.
He was also the founder of the highly influential English newspaper, The Leader, which was published from Allahabad in 1909.
On his 150th birth anniversary in 2011, then Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh announced that a Centre for Malviya Studies will be set up at the Banaras Hindu University apart from establishment of scholarships and education related awards in his memory, and UPA chairperson released a biography of Madan Mohan Malaviya.
He was also the Chairman of Hindustan Times from 1924 to 1946. His efforts resulted in the launch of its Hindi edition in 1936.