The Good Doctor Had His Problems

What we cannot ignore about Manmohan Singh

- HARTOSH SINGH BAL

The death of Manmohan Singh in December 2024 prompted a reassessment of a man who had faced heavy criticism from his political opponents towards the end of his second term as prime minister. Much of this can be put down to the usual tendency people have of not wanting to speak ill of the dead, but some of it also seems genuine and heartfelt. Certainly, the events that Singh set in motion, first as finance minister and then as prime minister, marked some of the most consequential changes the Indian polity has seen since Jawaharlal Nehru’s tenure.

However, implicit in many of these accounts of his achievements is the idea that money, finance and the economy determine the fate of a society. But these are not its only determinants. An assessment of Singh cannot stop with what liberalisation delivered, it must also include what it could have delivered—not just what Singh did, and but also what he failed to do.

Post-Nehruvian India has been shaped by the misdeeds of Indira Gandhi. It would be misplaced to read the Emergency as an aberration. The measures were a sign of Indira’s personality, one marked by an insecure authoritarianism. The path from the 1971 victory against Pakistan to the 1975 tyranny against her own citizens was filled with a series of grave errors. Indira’s return to power in 1980 turned out to be even more disastrous. She swung rightwards in her outlook but there remained a continuity in her desire to cling to power by any means possible. The events she set in motion during this period are still playing out, even after the rise of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Narendra Modi.