Bharat Ratna Controversy

India has not given highest civilian award "BHARAT RATNA" since 2001. A young journalist (TV reporter) started a furore by presenting a report on why india has not been able to find suitable candidate for Bharat Ratna and also suggested name of "Sachin Tendulkar" for the same.

Now the politics of "Bharat Ratna" started.The government of India started receiving messages from various political parties, recommending various politicians, who are either dead or retired or soon to retire or in a state of semi-retirement, for the Bharat Ratna. The Bharatiya Janata Party has recommended Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, the Bahujan Samaj Party has recommended the late Mr. Kanshi Ram, the communists are supposed to have been peddling the name of Mr. Jyoti Basu, whereas the Akalis are now supposed to have joined the race with Mr. Parkash Singh Badal as their candidate and the Telugu Desam Party is not far behind with their demand for the award to go to the late Mr. N. T. Rama Rao.

Bharat Ratna is india's highest civilian award, awarded for the highest degrees of national service. This service includes artistic, literary, and scientific achievements, as well as "recognition of public service of the highest order. Holders of the Bharat Ratna do not carry any special title or other honorific, but they get a special place in order of precedence of the country. Till date, Bharat Ratna has been awarded to 40 persons including two non-Indians (Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and Nelson Mandela) and a naturalised Indian citizen (Mother Teresa).

Politicial parties have forgotton that bharat ratna is award for good humanitarian work and not reward for loyality towards any politicial party. It can definitely be not decided by political parties.

New bharat ratna should be one who identifies with the rising india and with whom indian population identifies and is defintely a gem (ratna). It could be N R Murthy for his work in indian software industry,it could be sachin tendulkar for his contribution to cricket.

IF..

I first read this poem in a school textbook. I am not into poetry in a big way but I hold this very close to my heart. Read on to know why ...

[IF]
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

--Rudyard Kipling

This poem was written by Kipling in 1895 and was first published in the Brother Square Toes chapter of Rewards and Fairies.