PRIME Minister Narendra Modi announced on Saturday that BJP stalwart and former deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani will be conferred the Bharat Ratna, the country’s highest civilian award, and described it as a “very emotional moment for me”. “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,” Modi said on X. His decades-long service in public life has been marked by an unwavering commitment to transparency and integrity, setting an exemplary standard in political ethics, the Prime Minister said. Advani has made unparalleled efforts towards furthering national unity and cultural resurgence, he said.

 

“The conferring of the Bharat Ratna on him is a very emotional moment for me. I will always consider it my privilege that I got countless opportunities to interact with him and learn from him,” he said. Modi spoke to the BJP’s longest serving President, who is credited with crafting the party’s rise through the 90s when it came to power for the first time with Atal Behari Vajpayee heading coalition Governments, and congratulated him. Advani’s parliamentary interventions have always been exemplary and full of rich insights, Modi said. Soon after the Prime Minister’s announcement, a communication from the Rashtrapati Bhawan said President Droupadi Murmu has been pleased to award the Bharat Ratna to Advani. After the announcement, the 96-year-old leader greeted media persons from a distanceathis residence and his daughter Pratibha Advani told journalists that he is very happy at being given the country’s highest state honour.He thanked PM Modi and the people of the country, she said.

 

‘Dada’, she said in an affectionate reference to her father,noted thathehas dedicated his entire life to the country. Last month, the Government had named the late Karpoori Thakur,asocialist stalwart and former Bihar CM, for the highest honour. If the recognition for Thakur years afterhepassed away in 1988 was seen by many political experts as part of the BJP’s push to deepen its roots among the economically backward classes (EBC),acategoryfrom which he came from,the honour for Advani is being seen as a node to his instrumental role in shaping the party’s core ideology which has come to dominate the country’s polity under Modi. The Bharat Ratna will be bestowed on Advani in a year of the Ram temple’s consecration,which marks a triumphant closure forthe BJP of an issue which was thrust into popular consciousness by the veteran leader through his‘RamRath Yatra’ in 1990. The yatra and the mass appeal it drew boosted the party’s votes hare and made it the key challenger to the Congress, then the biggest national party