The highest-civilian award is given for exceptional service the advancement of art, literature and science, and in recognition of public service of the highest order.
» The decoration is in the form of a peepal leaf, about 5.8 cm long, 4.7 cm wide and 3.1 mm thick. It is of toned bronze. On its obverse is embossed a replica of the sun, 1.6 cm in diameter, below which the words “Bharat Ratna" are embossed in Hindi. On the reverse are State emblem and the motto, also in Hindi. The emblem, the sun and the rim are of platinum. The inscriptions are in burnished bronze.
» The first three recipients of Bharat Ratna were C. Rajagopalchari, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan and Dr. C.V. Raman in 1954 while Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan was the first foreigner to be honoured with this award in 1987.
| 1954 | Chakravarti Rajagopalachari, Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, Dr. Chandrasekhar Venkat Raman |
| 1955 | 1955 Dr. Bhagwan Das, Dr. Mokshagundam Visvesvaraiya, Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru. |
| 1957 | Pt. Govind Ballabh Pant |
| 1958 | Dr. Dhondo Keshave Karve |
| 1961 | Rajarshi Purushottam Das Tandon, Dr. Bidhan Chandra (B.C.) Roy |
| 1962 | Dr. Rajendra Prasad |
| 1963 | Dr. Zakir Hussain, Dr. Pandurang Vaman (P. V.) |
| 1966 | Kane Lai Bahadur Shastri (Posthumous) |
| 1972 | Mrs. Indira Gandhi |
| 1975 | Varahagiri Venkat (V.V.) Giri |
| 1976 | Kumaraswami (K.) Kamraj (Posthumous) |
| 1980 | Mary Teresa Bojaxhiu (Mother Teresa) |
| 1983 | Acharya Vinoba Bhave (Posthumous) |
| 1987 | Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan |
| 1988 | Marudur Gopalan (MG) Ramachandran (Posthumous) |
| 1990 | Dr. Bhim Rao Ramji Ambedkar (Posthumous), Dr. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela |
| 1991 | Rajeev Gandhi (Posthumous),Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel, Morarji Ranchhodji Desai |
| 1992 | Jahangir Ratanji Dadabhai (J. R. D.) Tata, Maulana Abdul Kalam azad (Posthumous), Satyajit Ray |
| 1997 | Aruna Asaf Ali (Posthumous), Guljarilal Naidu (Posthumous), Dr. Abdul Pakir Jainulabdeen (A. P. J. ) Abdul Kalam |
| 1998 | Maduri Sanmukhavadivn (M. S.) Subbulakshmi, Chidambaram (C) Subramaniam, Jayaprakash Narayan |
| 1999 | Prof. Amartya Sen, Pt. Ravi Shankar, Loknayak Jay Praksh Narayan (Posthumous), Gopinath Bordoloi (Posthumous) |
| 2001 | Lata Dinanath Mangeshkar, Ustad Bismillah Khan |
| 2009 | Pt. Bhimsen Gururaj Joshi |
| 2014 | Prof. C. N. R. Rao, Sachin Ramesh Tandulker, |