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It is a measure of the respect which
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh continues to inspire that he was
able to get away without any serious damage to his credibility
with admissions at his press conference that would have been
politically disastrous for any other politician.
Considering that he acknowledged the governance and ethical
"deficits" of his tenure, and blamed "coalition dharma" for the
unethical compromises, it was evident that the government's
failures far outweighed its successes.
What is more, since the compromises that he spoke of are known to
be responsible for one of the biggest swindles in recent memory,
it is patent enough that these did not entail ideological tussles,
but concerned corrupt practices that have led to the incarceration
of a minister in Delhi's well-known Tihar Jail.
An acknowledgment of such candour can be a millstone round a
politician's neck. Yet, the prime minister has escaped relatively
unhurt. Similarly, his observations that a great deal of
unfinished business remains to be done, that reforms have stalled
and that he is not a "lame duck" prime minister point to
weaknesses which anyone less upright would have been reluctant to
mention.
What has nevertheless helped him is the impression of sincerity
which he conveys with his mild manner, his hesitant way of
speaking - which was especially noticeable this time - and his
straightforward answers without any attempt to duck difficult
questions. Even if some of the replies seemed insipid and redolent
of the bureaucratic habit of harping on technicalities to avoid
being pinned down, it was his reputation for honesty which saw the
prime minister through.
Given the fact that there is still no large-scale "deficit" of
popular trust in him, there will be a sense of relief that he has
promised to "stay the course". It isn't only the aam admi who will
be relieved that no change of guard is in the offing, which could
have plunged the country into an uncertain future, the Congress
too must have realised that the party would have sunk much deeper
in the present scam-tainted atmosphere if someone other than
Manmohan Singh was at the helm.
The reason why the Congress continues to sail in choppy waters is
its long history of scandals, including perhaps the most notorious
of them all - the Bofors howitzer saga of 1987 - which brought
down the Rajiv Gandhi government's majority from a mammoth 415 in
1984 to 197 in 1989. It was followed by the P.V. Narasimha Rao
government which earned the dubious distinction of bribing the
Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) MPs to stay in power.
It is in the aftermath of these scandals that the Congress not
only lost power in 1996 but also appeared to have entered a period
where even its own supporters were sceptical about success. In
fact, the party was taken aback when it fared well enough in 2004
to be able to form a coalition government. But it was obvious to
all that this turn of fortunes was primarily the result of the
Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) mistakes, including the Gujarat
riots of 2002, which were held responsible by Atal Bihari
Vajpayee, its prime minister from 1998 to 2004, for its defeat.
To many, however, the present spate of scams are a sign that the
Congress is back to its old ways. However, to keep such
insinuations at bay, Manmohan Singh is the party's best bet. He
may be accused of being too nice a person or not being assertive
enough. Some of his admissions - "I did not feel I had the
authority to object to Raja's entry (to the cabinet in 2009)
because although complaints were coming, some were from those
companies that had not benefited" - even underline his excessive
leniency.
Even then, he comes out as a person whose personal integrity
seemingly blinds him to the deviousness of others. It may be a
fault in a person in such a responsible position since it can make
the unworthy take advantage of his innate goodness, but most
people will still prefer a decent individual as prime minister to
a crafty one.
At the same time, it is possible that Manmohan Singh is drawing
heavily on his personal resources of honesty. In fact, his
uprightness has made too many crooks run amok. As a result, the
focus will now be on seeing whether he is prepared to crack the
whip on the wrongdoers "this time", as he has said. Any further
dithering will be politically fatal for him and his party. Unless
the guilty are punished, his Teflon image will wear thin.
Apart from his reputation, Manmohan Singh and the Congress have
also benefited from the BJP's failure to deal with the allegations
of corruption in its own camp, notably in the case of Karnataka
Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa, some of whose acts have been
called "immoral", though not illegal, by his own party president
Nitin Gadkari. As a result, the party had to keep Yeddyurappa out
of all its recent anti-corruption meetings.
But there are others in the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA)
like Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who is both clean himself
and unrelenting in cracking down on corrupt officials in the
state.
Manmohan Singh's disadvantage is that he is politically
lightweight. Not being a stirring orator since he is too
academic-minded, he is not a crowd-puller and will be hard put to
win an election. His forte, however, is his uncluttered vision of
India's progress in the economic field, where he does not carry
the baggage of his party's old-fashioned socialism and is,
therefore, more in tune with the younger generation as well as the
new, consumerist middle and upper classes. It is these sections
which will be pleased with his determination not to give up "half
way".
(Amulya Ganguli
is a political analyst. He can be reached at aganguli@mail.com)
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