Dr. Manmohan Singh, PM (again)

So the Indian National Congress has enough seats (with support, of course) to form a government. After a lot of flak about his being a mere ‘underling’ to Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, Dr. Manmohan Singh has come through, and emphatically. Telegraph makes a point about Dr. Singh being more than a weak PM, and I think I agree.

I know, I don’t follow the news as closely as I’d like to, but I haven’t noticed any situation where the PM has done anything to put his position in scrutiny.

I am in general wary of politicians, but I think Dr. Singh has been one of the few politicians of the recent past who I have respect for: Mr. Atal B. Vajpayee as PM, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam as President, Mr. Jaswant Singh as Foreign Minister under Mr. Vajpayee, and Mr. Pranab Mukherjee as Foreign Minister in this administration. Dr. Singh joins the list for being a dignified, respected, learned, and I’d like to say principled PM.

India thinks Dr. Singh is a good PM. I agree.

P.S.: Compare, if you will, with the character that we have for President of India at this time: she called for an women’s only IIT in her husband’s home town, soon after becoming the Head of State.

Building a new IIT? I can understand. A women’s only institute? I can at least see where she’s coming from. But at her husband’s home town? C’mon.

And this lady is the President of India.

P.P.S.: There’s another interesting incident about Mrs. Patil’s visit to Brazil (I think) and her son quietly making a personal trip to the US in the middle, but I won’t go into that as I couldn’t locate any relevant news article about that. (Can someone find me a link?)

Conflicting ideas

This article I read quite a while back. I was outraged at the idea, for a number of reasons, decided I wanted to write about it, and how it wasn’t the right thing to do, and wanted to wonder how and why someone from an IIM – that gives the person’s views some prestige, doesn’t it? – would put forward such an article.

Well, I never really got down to it, and now the work has been done for me. Well, at least the first part about the whys and hows of the idea being a bad one. Here: go read. It’s an excellent post on why India should really refrain from having military strikes in Pakistan.

More, while discussing the situation, the author appreciates the role that the PM, Dr Manmohan Singh, and the Foreign Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee have played. In particular, he writes about the PM:

I’m glad the current administration is low on posturing and high on procedure. That’s what you get when policy wonks are in charge rather than poets. No charisma at all, little to appeal to the media or the public at large, but in the end more effective in making India’s case to the world. I can’t bear to watch Manmohan Singh speak for more than two minutes, but there’s no man I would rather have at India’s helm during the current global financial crisis.

Contrast the above with the following, from this blog post:

It would be good if Shourie were the PM. The man is smart, courageous, ethical, and has the national interest at heart. Which is more than you can say about Shri Manmohan Singh. I wish India had good political leadership but if wishes were horses . . .

My idea has more or less been that Dr Singh has more positives than negatives as PM. Of course, there’s a lot that I don’t know, but what has Dr Singh done (or not done) to deserve the above comment?

Someone, please enlighten me.