Commentary / Mani Shankar Aiyar
The Magic of Being Manmohan
Ahistorian evaluating the implications of the 21 ministers of
the Rao government at present under investigation would not be
able to stop his evaluation at that point. He would also have
to evaluate the implication of the most important economic minister
of the same Rao government having been Manmohan Singh.
Had Manmohan
been replaced by a more pliant politician, one whose value system
was more in accord with the 'politics is politics' school of morality,
the pickings of the minor economic ministries would have been
small beer compared to what one signature in North Block can secure.
That path was stoutly resisted by the prime minister all through
the tortuous turnings of five long years in a vocation of which
it is truly said, 'A week is a long time in politics!' How and
why did this happen?
The need to have, in a crisis, a finance minister of high technical
virtuosity was, of course, one reason. But once the worst of the
crisis was over, if Manmohan's only virtue had been technical virtuosity,
he would have been quickly and honourably eased out. He was not
because by then he had become an invaluable political asset.
It was also the kind of charge which a more prudent practising
politicians might have chosen to ignore. Manmohan, instead, took
the charge front on, explaining how his daughter had applied for
the scholarship when he was not even in India and had got the
scholarship entirely on merit on the basis of an outstanding academic
record. The very Opposition member who had made the allegation
called out his blessings on the bright young girl - and the canard
was killed on the spot. Once again, it was the magic of Manmohan's
transparency inspiring unchallengeable confidence.
It was around the same time that Prabhu Chawla, in the Indian
Express, came out with a wild allegation of Manmohan having leaked
state secrets to the IMF and the IMF having dictated to him the
Budget he should present to Parliament. It was vintage Ram Nath
Goenka-style muckraking. An attempt was made in Parliament to
make an issue of it; it fizzled out when a half-hearted Opposition
discovered the charges held no credibility in the public eye.
The great unwashed masses had spotted in Manmohan a person of
probity - and the same confidence-inspiring that had moved the
Bank of England moved also in the backlanes of humble India its
mysteries to perform. Manmohan went on to present the most celebrated
Budget in the history of independent India - the Budget of 1992.
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