Yoga guru Baba Ramdev expressed his disappointment with the fact that no saint has been given the Bharat Ratna in the last 70 years.
Speaking to reporters on Saturday, a day after the announcement of the Bharat Ratna, Ramdev demanded a Bharat Ratna for a saint or spiritual leader next time.
“It is unfortunate that in the last 70 years, not a single spiritual leader has been honoured with the Bharat Ratna –Maharishi Dayananda Saraswati, Swami Vivekananda ji, or even Shivakumara Swami ji,” Ramdev said.
Shivakumara Swami, the 110-year-old Lingayat seer and the tallest religious figure in Karnataka, passed away on 21 January 2019.
“Mai Bharat sarkar se aagrah karta hu ki agli baar kam se kam kisi sanyasi ko bhi Bharat Ratna diya jaye (I request the Indian government to at least give a Bharat Ratna to a saint the next time),” he said.
Calls for Bharat Ratna for the Siddaganga Mutt seer were also raised by the Congress.
Mallikarjun Kharge, senior Congress leader and Member of Parliament from Gulbarga, on Saturday said his party was disappointed that the late Lingayat seer was not given the country’s highest civilian award.
The NDA government on Friday announced Bharat Ratna for Bharatiya Jana Sangh ideologue Nanaji Deshmukh, eminent Assamese poet Bhupen Hazarika, and former President Pranab Mukherjee.
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“Bharat Ratna was conferred upon Pranab Mukherjee, I welcome this. But Shivakumara Swami ji worked a lot in the education sector and spent his life working for orphan children and sent them to schools. He should be awarded Bharat Ratna. We had expected this,” said Kharge.