New Delh: Former President Pranab Mukherjee, Bharatiya Jana Sangh leader Nanaji Deshmukh and Assamese singer Bhupen Hazarika will be conferred the country’s hig-hest civilian award Bharat Ratna, an official statement said on Friday.

The Bharat Ratna will be conferred after a gap of four years. On the last occasion, former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and founder of Banaras Hindu Unive-rsity Madan Mohan Malviya were given the award by the Narendra Modi government in 2015.

Deshmukh and Hazar-ika have been selected for the award posthumously.

Mr Mukherjee, 83, fondly known as “Pranab Da”, was the President between 2012 and 2017. Last year, the veteran Congress leader had drawn flak from certain quarters for attending an RSS function in Nagpur.

After the official announcement on Bharat Ratna, Mr Modi said Mr Mukherjee is an outstanding statesman of present times who has served the nation selflessly and tirelessly for decades.

“His (Mukherjee) wisdom and intellect have few parallels. Delighted that he has been conf-erred the Bharat Ratna,” Mr Modi tweeted.

Mr Mukherjee joins the elite club with Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, Rajendra Prasad, Zakir Hussain and V.V. Giri who had been conferred the coveted award.

Expressing gratitude over the award, Mr Mukherjee said, “I have got more from the people of our great country than I have given to them.”

“It is with a deep sense of humility and gratitude to the people of India that I accept this great honour #BharatRatna bestowed upon me,” he said in a tweet.

Mukherjee became India’s youngest finance minister in 1982 at the age of 47. From 2004, he went on to head three crucial ministries — external affairs, defence and finance — and became the first occupant of the Rashtrapati Bhavan to have this distinction.

Deshmukh was associated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) since 1928 till his death in Satna, Madhya Pradesh, in 2010 at the age of 94. He was known for starting the chain of RSS inspired schools. He was one of the founding members of the Bharatiya Jan Sangh which later evolved as the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Born in 1926, Hazarika was a playback singer, lyricist, musician, singer, poet and film-maker from Assam. He died in 2011.

A recipient of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award (1987), Padmashri (1977), Padmabhushan (2001) and Padma Vibhushan (2012-posthumously), Hazarika was also awarded with the Dada Saheb Phalke Award in 1992. Hazarika did his Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1952.

With these three recipients, 48 eminent people have been conferred the award so far.