It was just a few days after I had joined the Manmohan Singh PMO as media adviser. June 2009. There a small function at 7,RCR, an award-giving ceremony for the best steel production outfit. All the corporate honchos were in attendance. The ceremony ended, and over tea the steel tycoons were telling the prime minister that ‘something’ had to be done about ‘these Naxals’ who were making their life difficult. After a few minutes of this diatribe, Dr. Manmohan Singh politely observed, “Perhaps many of them [i.e. the so-called Naxals] believe that the system we have is very unfair to them.” Stunned corporate silence.
It was the first glimpse I was to have of how Singh had evolved from the finance minister of the 1991 reforms to a sensitive prime minister, mindful of the great inequalities and deprivations that marred the rural landscape. He had shed, if ever he was attached to it, that ponderous bunkum known as the trickle-down theory.
In retrospect, it is evident that very early in his second term, the corporate bosses had sensed that Singh was no longer the friendly prime minister they had backed in the 2009 election [against the BJP’s L.K.Advani.] They felt scorned. Soon there was the animated but entirely bogus talk of “policy paralysis.” Many of his own senior cabinet colleagues ended up creating an impression of a regime stranded in confusion and conflict.
It was only a matter of time before the word “corruption” became the screaming headline. Very many forces, outfits and individuals—some well-meaning, some crafty, some cunning and some downright communal—pooled their resources and voices to curdle the national mood against the Manmohan Singh government. But the campaign needed an acceptable mascot. The Bombay-based lalas brought Anna Hazare out of obscurity and “the India Against Corruption movement” was launched. The Ram Lila ground became our version of Tahrir Square. All the leading anchors competed with each other to find virtue and values in the likes of a clutch of Gandhi-topi wearing “crusaders”, with Baba Ramdev thrown into the mix. The aim was to wreck Manmohan Singh’s middle-class constituency. Why? Because unless the middle classes were alienated from Singh’s government, the communal messaging which had been readied for deployment would not get heard across the land.
It was during those trying days that I remember asking the prime minister whether there was anything the government could do to make the corporate-backers of the so-called Anna Hazare movement be reasonable. His response was simple: “There are many ways. They are all ugly ways and I do not want to travel that path.”
Was the weakness on his part? Or, moral clarity.
It requires the greatest of certitude, self-awareness, intellectual broadmindedness and democratic commitment to resist using the coercive powers of the state. Anybody can play the daroga, but it needs a certain kind of strength to spurn the danda.
As prime minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh had enormous respect for the structures of accountability. His attitude was that whatever the government did or did not do, it had an obligation to explain itself. He thought in a democracy the regime drew its legitimacy from public acceptance and this legitimacy needed to be regularly reinforced and validated. Without public acceptance, the regime is left with a sullen citizenry. And that would not do—because without people’s cooperation and compliance, all the well-meaning schemes come to a grinding halt.
As his media adviser, I always found him respectful of the institution of the reporter, the editor and the newspaper. On January 1, 2012 he gone to visit the Golden Temple. Those were the days of the Anna Hazare hysteria. And, all the television channels were out there, catching a glimpse of “the prime minister under siege.” The cameras lingered on two individuals animatedly waving black flags. It was an exercise in disproportionate journalism.
As media adviser, I was disappointed and I asked the prime minister’s permission to issue a statement—something to the effect that he was entitled to be left alone to pray and that his privacy was unfairly breached. His unmeditated response was a gentle rebuke: “Harish, I have a right to pray and nobody denied me that right; I paid my obeisance. Without hindrance. The reporters have a right to report and why should there be any objection to what they choose to report.” It was a worthy rebuke from a worthy and wise man.
Manmohan Singh was the perfect child of Nehruvian India and it was entirely natural that he should have had such a respectful attitude towards the media fraternity. He knew very many journalists personally, and thought it was unworthy of a prime minister to want to degrade an unfriendly editor.
Neither as prime minister nor after he demitted office did he ever allow himself to give in to bitterness, even towards those who proved unfaithful and disloyal to him. Revenge and retribution was not his game.
Harish Khare, a former Editor in Chief of The Tribune and Resident Editor of The Hindu. served as Media Adviser to Prime Minster Manmohan Singh from June 2009 to January 2012.
