This is a list of recipients of Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award of India.
- Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar
- Aruna Asaf Ali
- Abul Kalam Azad
- Vinoba Bhave
- Gopinath Bordoloi
- K. Kamaraj
- Mother Teresa
- Bhagwan Das
- Morarji Desai
- Indira Gandhi
- Rajiv Gandhi
- V. V. Giri
- Zakir Hussain (politician)
- Abdul Kalam
- Pandurang Vaman Kane
- Dhondo Keshav Karve
- Bismillah Khan
- Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan
- Nelson Mandela
- Lata Mangeshkar
- Gulzarilal Nanda
- Jayaprakash Narayan
- Jawaharlal Nehru
- Govind Ballabh Pant
- Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel
- Rajendra Prasad
- Purushottam Das Tandon
- Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
- C. Rajagopalachari
- M. G. Ramachandran
- C. V. Raman
- Satyajit Ray
- Bidhan Chandra Roy
- Amartya Sen
- Ravi Shankar
- Lal Bahadur Shastri
- M. S. Subbulakshmi
- Chidambaram Subramaniam
- J. R. D. Tata
- Bhimsen Joshi
- Mokshagundam Visvesvarayya
- Sachin Tendulkar
- C. N. R. Rao
- Madan Mohan Malaviya
- Atal Bihari Vajpayee