Manmohan Singh's strength as Prime Minister of India was his moral compass

As media adviser, I witnessed his quiet resilience, democratic commitment, and moral clarity during the turbulence of his second term.

- Harish Khare

As media adviser, I witnessed his quiet resilience, democratic commitment, and moral clarity during the turbulence of his second term. In a time of corporate discontent, media frenzy, and political sabotage, he chose integrity over coercion, embodying the values of a true statesman.

It was just a few days after I had joined the Manmohan Singh PMO as media adviser, June 2009. There a small function at 7,RCR, an award-giving ceremony for the best steel production outfit. All the corporate honchos were in attendance. The ceremony ended, and over tea the steel tycoons were telling the prime minister that 'something' had to be done about 'these Naxals' who were making their life difficult. After a few minutes of this diatribe, Dr. Manmohan Singh politely observed, "Perhaps many of them [i.e. the so-called Naxals] believe that the system we have is very unfair to them." Stunned corporate silence.

It was the first glimpse I was to have of how Singh had evolved from the finance minister of the 1991 reforms to a sensitive prime minister, mindful of the great inequalities and deprivations that marred the rural landscape. He had shed, if ever he was attached to it, that ponderous bunkum known as the trickle-down theory.