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Congress CMs vote for Dhirubhai's Bharat Ratna

Sunil Jain in New Delhi

With the Padma season on hand, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has been deluged with letters from various Congress chief ministers recommending the late Dhirubhai Ambani's name for a posthumous Bharat Ratna.

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has also recommended a Bharat Ratna for the late founder of India's largest corporate entity, Reliance Industries Ltd.

The Congress chief ministers who have written to the PM include Karnataka Chief Minister S M Krishna, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dixit, Chattisgarh Chief Minister Ajit Jogi, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, and Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi.

"The story of his life and his journey is a commentary on the equality of opportunities India offers to his citizens", reads Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dixit's letter to the Prime Minister.

Dixit's accolades refer to Ambani's contribution to kick-start the equity cult in the country as one of the major reasons to confer the country's top honour on the late Ambani - Reliance has the world's largest number of equity shareholders today, and was the first company that began to tap the country's capital markets to fund its aggressive expansion plans.

Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Ajit Jogi has recommended the award on the grounds that "the heights of achievements scaled by Dhirubhai during his short life epitomise the strength of our nation-state."

While a final decision on Dhirubhai's Bharat Ratna will be taken by the prime minister over the next few weeks, the move to confer him this award was turned down during the last Padma season, around the same time last year.

At that time, sources say, the government was willing to award a Padma Vibhushan to the Reliance's founder, but the Ambani family felt that anything less than a Bharat Ratna would not do justice to Dhirubhai's contribution to the economy.

Apart from the late JRD Tata, other industrialists who've got high national honours include current Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata who was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2000. In 2001, the Padma Bhushan was awarded to M S Oberoi and Rahul Bajaj. Dr K Anji Reddy of Dr Reddy's Lab was awarded the Padma Shri. In 2002, Tata Consultancy Services' deputy chairman F C Kohli was also awarded the Padma Bhushan, as did Larsen & Toubro's chairman emeritus Heniing Holck Larsen. Mahindra & Mahindra chief Keshub Mahindra was awarded the Padma Bhushan in the year 2000, but turned it down following protests over this given that he was the non-executive chairman of Union Carbide India during the Bhopal gas tragedy. Infosys chief N R Narayana Murthy received the Padma Shri the same year.

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