#dnaEdit: Honouring heroes

The buzz that the Narendra Modi government wants to honour long departed national icons like Madan Mohan Malviya, Subhas Chandra Bose and Kanshi Ram with Bharat Ratna, renews the debate over how far back in history can one reach to celebrate the nation’s leaders. Malviya had passed away in 1946, many months before Independence.

Bose died in an air crash in 1945. Kanshi Ram, the founder of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), passed away in 2006. Each one of them had played a distinct and distinguished role in the national life, and they need to be honoured. But can it be done years after the death of the leader, 70 years in the case of Bose, 69 and nine years respectively in the case of Malviya and Kanshi Ram? Due to a host of reasons, governments of the day fail to honour the heroes. But it points to the failure of those who failed to honour them and not of the leaders who had met the highest standards for deserving the highest award of the land. The fact that Mahatma Gandhi did not get the Nobel Peace Prize reflects poorly on the Nobel committee rather than on Gandhi. 

There is also the problem of timing and common sense. The Bharat Ratna award, which came into existence in 1954, was not there to offer at the time of Malviya, Bose and Patel. Giving them the Bharat Ratna now is like giving the Nobel Prize in Physics to Isaac Newton. The Nobel Prize came into existence in 1900. For instance, Chandra Shekhar, who otherwise possessed immense common sense, did indeed err in posthumously conferring Bharat Ratna to Patel in 1991. A lame gesture to honour the Iron Man.

In case of military honour, a soldier dying in action is awarded a medal of honour immediately after his death. A similar criterion seems to have been applied to MG Ramachandran, the iconic Tamil Nadu leader and to Rajiv Gandhi. It had much to do with the sentiment of the moment, and in the cases of MGR and Rajiv, the sentiment was indeed overwhelming. The general rule in conferring civilian awards should be to honour the living or not long after their death. It makes eminent sense to honour Atal Bihari Vajpayee with Bharat Ratna because though frail and ailing, he is still alive. The country should honour this brilliant politician before it is too late.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi seems keen to right what he perceives to be the neglect of great leaders, slighted by the partisan Congress, especially by the Nehru-Gandhis.

This, however, is a wrong perception. The Bharat Ratna in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s went to conservative leaders as well. A great Sanskrit scholar and historian of the Dharma Shastras, PV Kane was given the Bharat Ratna in 1963. And so was Purushottam Das Tandon in 1962, the right-wing Congress leader whom Nehru had opposed. 

The great heroes of the past remain great sans the Bharat Ratna. Mahatma Gandhi is the finest example of a leader who shines despite not receiving the Nobel for Peace.

Hopefully, no one would do the silly thing of giving him the Bharat Ratna posthumously. If there had been a perceptive selection committee which decides on the Bharat Rata, then Kanshi Ram would have been the recipient of this award long before his death. What we need to do now is not to neglect the heroes living among us rather than indulge in petty brinkmanship in choosing the brave men who left us a long time ago.