Eternal Silence replaces Silent Existence
Posted : December 24, 2004 at 8:20 pm [IST]
PV Narasimha Rao is no more. I liked his impression-less face. Sometimes it appeared to me a real shrewd one. But I liked him more as a scholar. He knew many languages. I was reminded of his great command over Hindi and Urdu beside other foreign languages, when I heard yesterday a character who is just the opposite. I mean Shri Dev Ghowda- another former prime minister who still aspires to be the prime minister one day, but can’t speak Hindi even after taking some crash courses.
But the best part of Rao was his selection of a technocrat such as Dr. Man Mohan Singh as Finance Minister and delegation of the total responsibility of reviving the poorest condition of the country’s economy with full support. I was excited to find Dr. Singh, the present Prime Minister declaring Late Rao as ‘The godfather of India’s economic reform’. It is magnanimity of Dr. Singh. The duo brought back the confidence and pride of the nation and that too very fast. Even a commoner picked up some terms such as ‘foreign exchange reserves’, GDP growth, liberalization and globalization that were not very popularly quoted earlier and their meanings too. His handling of foreign affairs was praiseworthy.
He was an intellectual with root in rural India and survived the cruel assaults from politician crooks that he decided early in life to make company with. As otherwise, how could have tolerated a buffoon such as Sita Ram Kesari?
He gave silence a meaning and perhaps a means for survival. In his ‘Insider’ he talked against the dynamistic democracy of the country. His silence after loosing the war of supremacy in Congress Party was something unique and exemplary for the old timers to emulate. All the print media today is full with good articles about him. Except for some young and immature TV channel news readers who talk without a text, the whole of print media today was full of his praise.
Very soon the people will forget Narshimha Rao, but he will certainly remain the main creator of liberalized economy. And when India becomes ’superpower’ one day, he shall be their as one who started it in a big way. I quote some headlines from some news papers:
“The god father of India’s economic reforms is gone”
“Rao unshackled business fetters”
“The legacy of 1001-96 still lives on”
-Times of India
“Rao, Prime Minister of India Changing, is dead: P V Narasimha Rao, the man who presided over the most dramatic paradigm shift in post-independent India’s attitude towards itself and the world, died this afternoon. He was 83″
-Indian Express
The mind of the Insider By Sekhar Gupta: Narasimha Rao was not the most accessible or charismatic of PMs. But he was always on the job. P.V. Narasimha Rao was the first serving prime minister I got to meet one-on-one in my reporting days and I had done very little to deserve that honour
-Indian Express
Behind chill, healthy respect- RASHEED KIDWAI
P.V. Narasimha Rao’s relations with Sonia Gandhi remained shrouded in mystery. Both reticent persons, they did little to set the record straight.
Two legacies & a leader, Singh inherits crown, thorn: P.V. Narasimha Rao, who died on Thursday afternoon, took India to the market, left behind a festering wound at Ayodhya and gave the nation its current Prime Minister. -The Telegraph
PS. Rao stays outside, even in death: New Delhi/Hyderabad, Dec. 24: Even in death, P.V. Narasimha Rao kept away from the Congress headquarters that he had avoided since being forced to step down as party chief in humiliating fashion eight years ago. The former Prime Minister’s 9, Motilal Nehru Marg house in Delhi is barely 200 metres from the 24, Akbar Road Congress headquarters but Rao never visited the office after being forced out of the top party job just months after the 1996 Lok Sabha election rout.
His body was not about to do so either.
The flower-decked army gun carriage carrying Rao’s body was to have been kept briefly at the Congress office this morning for the party rank and file to get a last glimpse before it was flown down to Hyderabad. But the gun carriage could not make it past the main gate,
Lover of obscurity-The prime minister of consensus by Sunda K. Dutta Roy in The Telegraph
P.V. Narasimha Rao made a revealing complaint and an intriguing request at our last meeting two years ago. Reiterating that he was the only Congress prime minister “not of the family” to complete a full term, he added bitterly, “And I am still paying for it!” The request was to send him a set of critical questions about the demolition of the Babri Masjid. “Don’t spare me,” he urged. “Be as harsh as you can.”
- Indra
Category: Indian politics |
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