‘A grass blade in a storm’: Arc of Manmohan Singh’s journey, from economic reform face to ‘accidental PM’

“I have nothing to be ashamed of about my prime ministership,” Dr Manmohan Singh told me when I met him in August 2023.

In 2014, towards the end of his second term as the Prime Minister, Singh had said, “History will be kinder to me than the media.” This was at a time when he was getting attacked for being a “weak PM”, with Sonia Gandhi acknowledged as the power behind the throne during the two terms of his premiership.

The 91-year-old Manmohan Singh has just retired from active politics — after being an MP for 33 years. And as India readies for another mega electoral battle, and as parties start trading fireworks, it is a moment to consider the journey this scholarly, soft-spoken, cautious leader attacked for his silences – he was called “mauni baba” – has made. After Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi, he is the only Indian PM who ruled for ten years.

His sixth Rajya Sabha term ended on Wednesday. He has always been a member of the Upper House.

Singh contested the Lok Sabha election once — from South Delhi in 1999 — but lost. It was suspected at the time that some senior Congress leaders had worked behind the scenes to ensure his defeat in a bid to prevent him from acquiring the image of a popularly elected leader. After that, the once-bitten, twice-shy Singh never attempted a run for the Lok Sabha – not taking that risk even when he was the PM from 2004 to 2014.

Interestingly, as he retired from the Rajya Sabha, Sonia Gandhi enters the Upper House for the first time as a Congress MP from Rajasthan — the state that Singh represented for the last six years, having been elected to the House earlier from Assam.

Today, one wonders what would be Singh’s thoughts on his journey – his achievements as well as what he would have