Beginning to the End of Dr Manmohan Singh

I always wondered how long Dr Manmohan Singh honeymoon with the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty would continue. And more importantly, how it would end. Dr Manmohan Singh is only the third Congress Prime Minister, after Lal Bahadur Shastri and PV Narasimha Rao outside the dynasty. Interestingly, both Shastri and Rao are considered to be best of class among the Indian PM's. Shastri term, though very short - was impressive and successful. Rao, depsite changing the destiny of a bankrupt nation - had many shortcomings (and continue to pay price for his times at New Delhi). Dr Manmohan Singh who was picked up by Rao as his Finance Minister had a meteoric raise in Indian Politics. But, his PM record thus far is very poor. Now, New Delhi is agog with the rumours that the relationship between 7, Racecourse Road and 10, Janpath are soured.

As it happened with Rao, the mud is being picked up and for the first time I am reading of Dr Singh and his record with substantial negative tone. And here are the some of the points from the Rediff by Virendra Kapoor:


On Dr Singh Personality
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is an honourable man, squeaky clean financially, though many of his foes and former associates questioned his intellectual honesty due to his capacity to rationalise socialist controls and market freedoms depending on the exigencies of the situation at hand.

As an economic bureaucrat, he rose fast to become a full secretary to the government, due to his ingrained habit of keeping on the right side of ministerial and administrative bosses.

A former teacher at the Delhi School of Economics, he left his peers in the academic world far behind, attaining new heights, first in the bureaucratic hierarchy and later in the political world. 
 Aside from a stroke of immense good fortune, Dr Singh clearly had certain other characteristics, which facilitated his rise to the prime minister's post.

The most notable trait in his mental make-up, which played a vital role in his rise to the top is his ability to convince his interlocutors about his lack of ambition, his self-effacement.

In short, an ability to project an unthreatening persona.


On Dr Singh Clever or Cunning moves

That was why Congress President Sonia Gandhi singled him out for the prime minister's post in preference to far more clued-up practitioners of realpolitik like Pranab Mukherjee and Arjun Singh to relatively younger leaders like P Chidambaram.

Thus, the image of a non-politician politician has served Dr Singh's cause rather well.

Admittedly, he carried that image of a non-politician with him to the prime minister's office.

So, even as he sits in the prime ministerial 'gaddi', the dirty job of mustering the numbers in Parliament so that the government can win the vote on the nuclear deal, or using the Central Bureau of Investigation to soften up hard-core politicians like Lalu Prasad and Mulayam Singh, or exploiting gubernatorial offices to sack inconvenient governments or to install convenient ones, is left to professional politicians in the Congress party.

The latest: The blame for appointing a tainted bureaucrat as the Central Vigilance Commissioner is not put on 'Teflon' Singh.

Thus, whatever the situation, our man always succeeds in giving the impression that he did not soil his hands in the dirty business that is everyday, pragmatic party politics. is always above the fray, always innocent.

On Dr Singh's Gratitude

Why is one psychoanalysing Manmohan Singh, and why now?

Well, the prime minister's interaction with a group of editors last Monday has caused most Delhi politicos to turn into amateur mind readers.

Though the media has surprisingly sought to downplay the import of his remarks, senior politicians, especially in the ruling Congress party, are engrossed in dissecting his each word to espy Dr Singh's real intentions.

There are even hints that 10, Janpath's establishment has not taken kindly to his far-from-innocent remarks, especially when he is known to weigh his words most carefully and is not given to empty talk.

Therefore, the dynasty loyalists have taken umbrage at the fact that Dr Singh failed to make a public gesture of volunteering to step down in favour of the crown prince.

Significantly, he omitted the name of the one prime minister who had pulled him out of retirement and made him finance minister and, thus set him up on the journey to the prime minister's office.

That prime minister's name is P V Narasimha Rao.

Rao has not got his due either from the Congress dynasty or from Dr Singh who, at least, ought to have known better than to allow the momentous contribution of his benefactor to go unacknowledged.

Since his meeting with the editors, Congressmen have buttonholed journalists to find out Dr Singh's 'exact words' in order to read the import of his remarks and to fathom his game plan for the future. No, one is not exaggerating.

There is a great deficit of trust between the prime minister and the Sonia Gandhi-led party, a major reason for the UPA-II government's non-performance.

Now, contrary to the general impression that he is a mild-mannered man devoid of any personal ambition, there are those who are convinced that behind that goody-goody exterior lurks a calculating man plotting carefully each move in order to emerge on top of every situation.

Looking at his long career graph, beginning with an adviser's post in the commerce ministry back in the late 1960s to the office of the prime minister, quite a few observers suspect him of being not all that innocent, nay, of being mealy-mouthed and clever. 



I think Sep 2010 marks the beginning to the end of Dr Manmohan public life and perhaps his impeccable record (how ever little or big they might be). He is no more a holy cow.

I am keen to see how Congress is going to bury another non dynasty PM. Let's watch this space