Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Tuesday piloted a resolution through the state assembly to ask the Centre to confer Bharat Ratna, the country’s highest civilian award, on former Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao to mark his birth centenary being celebrated this year.

K Chandrasekhar Rao, popularly known as KCR, requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi to make the announcement during the upcoming Parliament session. The assembly also resolved to request the Centre to install a statue and portrait of Narasimha Rao in Parliament annexe, besides renaming the Hyderabad Central University after India’s prime minister between 1991 and 1996. Assembly speaker Pocharam Srinivas Reddy has already approved a request to unveil the former prime minister portrait in the assembly complex.

The assembly’s push to place PV Narasimha Rao is part of KCR’s effort to place the former prime minister’s contribution on par with the country’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.

Bhatti Vikramarka, leader of the Congress Legislative Party in the assembly backed the demand. The Telangana unit of the Congress supports the demand to ensure that KCR’s Telangana Rashtra Samithi doesn’t appropriate his legacy in his home state though Rao’s uneasy relationship with the Nehru-Gandhi family is well known.

Also Read: TRS, Congress in tussle to claim legacy of ex-PM Narasimha Rao

The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen,(AIMIM) the party led by Asaduddin Owaisi, boycotted the discussion in the assembly, saying the party didn’t support the resolution seeking Bharat Ratna for the former PM. “AIMIM MLAs boycotted Telangana Assembly proceedings following a resolution that proposed Bharat Ratna for PV Narasimha Rao. As Prime Minister, Rao failed to protect Babri Masjid from demolition & his communal politics is well known,” the party later tweeted its opposition to the resolution.

KCR had spoken of plans to push for the country’s highest civilian award for Narasimha Rao at his 99th birth anniversary in June, complaining that Telangana’s ‘proud son’ did not get the due respect in the Congress.

The Telangana government has announced events throughout the year to honour the late prime minister’s birth centenary, which started at PV Gnana Bhoomi on June 28 this year.

“We also want the entire country to remember him and his contributions to the nation,” KCR told the state assembly on Tuesday.

Rao described Narasimha Rao as a statesman, intellectual par excellence and a multi-linguist, crediting Rao with introducing modern economic reforms and paving the way for making India one of the largest economies in the world.

“Only two leaders turned India’s modern history. One was Jawaharlal Nehru, the architect of modern India and the second one was P V Narasimha Rao who was the maker of global India,” he said.

KCR said Rao took over as the prime minister at a time when the country was in the middle of serious economic trouble. “He led a minority government for a full five-year term and also introduced revolutionary economic reforms in the country. He opened gates for privatisation and created employment for scores of Indians,” the chief minister said, praising Narasimha Rao for appointing Dr Manmohan Singh as his finance minister.

“His reforms changed the lives of the poor in India forever and improved the living standards of an average citizen. We are enjoying the seeds sown by him,” KCR said, adding that the former PM had also taken steps to build on ties with the US and Israel apart from coming up with the Look East policy that served as the foundation for his successors. The peace on Indo-China borders for over three decades was due to the diplomatic strategies of Rao, he said.