Understated politician who could pull off impossible tasks

After he ceased being finance minister in 1996, friends advised Manmohan Singh to not get lost in the value-free world of Congress politics, and to nurse his support base among those who admired him for spearheading economic reforms.

- ADITI PHADNIS

Singh's response, stated with his shy smile, was: "But I am in politics." That was usually met with skeptical silence, as though his listeners didn't see him that way at all.

The fact is, baldly stated, Manmohan Singh was a politician, though he avoided admitting this. What is more, he was a skilled negotiator. Few remember that it was Manmohan Singh who was sent to work out an alliance between the Congress and the People's Democratic Party (PDP) in Jammu and Kashmir after the state elections there in 2002. Mindful of how important it was to provide stability to this sensitive border state, and making sure the government was a truly representative one, Singh managed the impossible: A rotating chief ministership between the Congress led by Ghulam Nabi Azad and PDP led by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.

The relationship unravelled six months ahead of the Assembly elections in 2008. But by acting as an honest broker, he managed to put in place an arrangement that won the confidence of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. It was the first and, mostly successful, experiment with a rotating chief ministership.

This quality came in handy when Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leader Mayawati called him to congratulate him after the 2009 Lok Sabha victory. He won her over by referring to her as "my younger sister". From anyone else, it might have sounded cheesy. From Singh, it was the equivalent of a garland: An open-minded embrace of the socially deprived. Similarly, it was healthy pragmatism on the part of the Samajwadi Party (SP), but also Singh's reaching out to the SP leaders, which saved his government from falling in the late summer of 2008. The two parties were bitter enemies: They came together for Manmohan Singh.