Will Manmohan Singh deserve any more than a footnote in history? | N.R.Mohanty

Published on 02-11-2007 In National

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Will Manmohan Singh deserve any more than a footnote in history?

Prem Shankar Jha, a celebrated columnist, is a readers' delight for his cogent arguments as well as incisive style. But I am amazed, rather disappointed, at his fawning words for our Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

In the November 5 issue of the weekly magazine, Outlook, he writes: Dr (Manmohan) Singh would do well to use the three weeks that remain till November 16 to explain over and over again to the Indian public what the consequences will be of our reneging on our own treaty. And he should make it clear that he is bound by the decision of the Indian cabinet in both letter and spirit, and will proceed with the IAEA negotiations from the next day, regardless of what the joint committee decides. If the Congress hacks and its president demur, then he should resign"

That was the operative part, what Manmohan Singh must do. Then follows the descriptive part, what Manmohan Singh is: "Dr Singh has been the most liked prime minister we have had since Rajiv Gandhi and the most respected since Nehru. It is time he thought of his place in history".

What I am amazed is that a writer of the stature of Prem Shankar Jha can be so fulsome in his praise for a leader who has survived in politics because of his sheer gutlessness.

And, again, it is not a one-time tribute to a man who is at the helm of power at the moment. In his column in the same magazine last week (October 29 issue), he wrote: "Dr Singh can still save the country from Permanent second class status, and his own place in history, by submitting his resignation and allowing the Congress to decide whether it will let him go and face the public's wrath, or fall in line with his wishes and call the Left's bluff." That was again the operative part. The descriptive part that followed was like this:" If Dr Singh had any idea of the power of his office, and of how well-loved and respected he is in the country, he would not think twice".

Mr. Jha's operative advice to the prime minister is that he must resign, rather threaten to resign, to blackmail the Congress and its president and other allies into accepting the nuclear deal as a fait accompli. But Mr Jha forgets that Dr Singh, in his long years in public life, has only contemplated resignation but never carried it out because the lure of power has been too irresistible for him.

He had contemplated resignation when he was the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission and Rajiv Gandhi, then Prime Minister, called the commission a "bunch of jokers'. He had threatened to resign when the securities scam broke out and his ministry was held responsible for the large-scale swindling, but he held on to the office. And now as prime minister, when he dared the Left to withdraw support to the government over the Indo-US nuclear deal and the Left called his bluff, again his threat of resignation turned out to be hollow.

Mr. Jha can very well see that Dr Singh has his priorities clearly laid down. He is ready to make any compromises to survive in power. The resignation drama that he indulged in is just to prop up an image that he is a reluctant politician. His spin-doctors are busy trying to put a gloss on his failures. And I am surprised that a venerable journalist like Mr. Jha has fallen for this make-believe.

To repeat Mr. Jha's words: "Dr Singh has been the most liked prime minister we have had since Rajiv Gandhi and the most respected since Nehru." Mr. Jha ought to have added the adjective 'most vulnerable' as well. No Prime Minister in India's history, Chandra Shekhar and Charan Singh included, had his authority clipped as much as Manmohan Singh's.

He is certainly the most educated of our Prime Ministers – Jawaharlal Nehru was later to become a great scholar, but he was just an ordinary graduate in natural sciences from Trinity college, Cambridge.

Even his training at Inner Temple, London was without any distinction. Most other prime ministers that India has had were virtually semi-literates. Manmohan Singh has earned a doctorate from a prestigious university like Cambridge and would have made a first-rate academic had he not strayed into the corridors of power. He chose to become a successful Indian as well as international civil servant.

Then came the political tryst. The financial crisis that India found itself in 1990 had led the then Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar to pledging our gold reserve to tide over the balance of payment crisis. The Narasimha Rao government in 1991 was forced to make a paradigm shift in India's economic policies to keep itself afloat. It was an imperative need that a professional economist, well versed in the arcane ways of the government, must become the new finance minister.

Narasimha Rao's first choice was supposed to be I G Patel, a distinguished economist and civil servant, who had handled the top economic administration in India and abroad over many years and who had the distinction to become the director of the London School of Economics. But Patel apparently declined the offer as he was not cut out for the rough and tumble of politics. Manmohan Singh was the second choice and he lapped it up.

No doubt, his achievement as a finance minister was creditworthy. From a mere 1.3 per cent GDP growth rate in 1991-92, Singh powered a growth trajectory that was incredible; it reached 8.6 per cent in 1995-96. Again, what added lustre to his name was his formidable reputation of personal honesty and integrity.

But when Sonia Gandhi picked him up for the job of prime minister, she had no love lost for his honest credentials; after all, she had chosen many corrupt men to head key ministries so that they could line their pockets and contribute to the party coffers. The Congress president wanted someone of stature who would remain loyal to her and would not develop an independent base of power.

She must have learnt a lesson from her mother-in-law's past. Indira Gandhi was propped up as PM by the Congress Syndicate hoping that she would be at their beck and call, but once in power she grew wings and cut them to size.
What went in Manmohan Singh's favour was that he had no political standing. He had never won a popular election. In the 1999 general election, he, the architect of India's globalization policies, even failed to win the Lok Sabha seat in South Delhi, a constituency-- home to the votaries of globalization. That showed how politically effete he was.

Pranab Mukherjee was also in the reckoning for the job. He had also not won a popular election till 2004. But Pranab Mukherjee -- with all his abilities to make deals with the Left and the Right, with capitalists as well as social activists -- carried the threat of growing in the office of the prime minister to take on Sonia Gandhi herself.

Manmohan got the job, but did not grow on it. He, to a large extent, lived up to the expectations of Sonia Gandhi – to remain a low-key, hands-off head of government who scrupulously kept away from building a power centre of his own. He has no hesitation in acknowledging that his first loyalty is to the First Family of the party. In doing this, he besmirched the reputation of the high office he holds.

Yes, as Mr. Jha says, it is time Dr Singh thought of his place in history – it couldn't be anything more than a footnote as he has let down the people and the country.

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