Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Madan Mohan Malviya to be honoured with Bharat Ratna

New Delhi: The Narendra Modi led government is likely to announce Bharat Ratna for veteran BJP leader and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and educationist Madan Mohan Malviya on Thursday, Dec 25. The government chose to announce it's decision on Dec 25 as it's the veteran leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee's birthday. The same day is also celebrated as 'good governance day' by the central government.

According to sources, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is going to recommend Atal Bihari Vajpayee's name for the Bharat Ratna to President Pranab Mukherjee, today in the afternoon. Prior to this, PM Modi had held a meeting with the top BJP leaders to decide upon conferring the Bharat Ratna to the former Prime Minister. 

The meeting was attended by Arun Jaitley, Sushma Swaraj, Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah. Besides Atal Bihari Vajpayee , educationist Madan Mohan Malviya, the founder of the Banaras Hindu University will also be honoured with the Bharat Ratna.

The Banaras Hindu University is in PM Modi's constituency, Varanasi. It has been 5 years now since the BJP leaders have been demanding the Bharat Ratna for their veteran leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Bharat Ratna is the highest civilian award conferred to one for their outstanding service.