Tribute to Dr Manmohan Singh from Pakistan :: Dr Singh used Satish Lambah to talk 'behind closed doors' with Gen Pervez Mushar­raf’s nominee Tariq Aziz to work on Indo-Pak ties

"Like Khushwant Singh who never forgot his Hadali roots, Dr Sahib (Manmohan Singh) remembered Gah (now in Pakistan), but he could not forget that his grandfather had been murdered there in 1947. 

Seventy-two years later, in November 2019, he came to Pakistan briefly, but only to attend the opening of the Kartarpur border. "

The unhealed scar of partition lay “too deep for tears”.

 -- writes Pakistani author F S Aijazuddin in 'Dawn' published January 2, 2025  

In fact, giving the title of the piece - "Faith in himself" Aijazuddin starts the article with quite a catchy line - 

"To remember Sardar Manmohan Singh is to recall an age when principles were practised, ideals realised, and self-effacement was not a defect". 

Truly these qualities are weaknesses and also vanishing arts !

We already stepped into Generation Beta yesterday (Jan 1, 2025) --- our youngsters already find us emotional fools. I (blogger) do not blame them. It is universal. But the elders have played a part in sowing the seeds of selfishness -- directly and indirectly. 

In any case coming back to Aijazuddin's piece -- he also notes :

"A man with lesser self-confidence might have chafed at being tied to Sonia Gandhi’s ‘paloo’-style of governance. Dr Singh’s loyalty to the Gandhi family though remained immutable. 

On many occasions, he must have regretted that it had not been repaid in equal measure, echoing Cardinal Wol­sey’s regret: “Had I but served God as diligently as I have served the King, he would not have given me over in my grey hairs.”  

The article says - "In 2004, a victorious Mrs Sonia Gandhi chose Dr Manmohan Singh to be her prime minister. She remained the puppeteer, controlling (not always invisibly) Dr Singh’s actions and movements. Despite being thus hamstrung, he survived as India’s prime minister for 10 years, serving two consecutive terms.

In his first, he basked in the sunshine of a promised optimism. In his second, he came under a cloud of financial scandals. (“A reformer,” Edward Gibbon cautioned, “should be exempt from the suspicion of interest.”) Dr Singh’s personal reputation put him beyond the pale of suspicion, but it could not insulate him from the wrongdoings of more fallible colleagues."

Aijazuddin

Aijazuddin's other works include Pahari Paintings & Sikh Portraits in the Lahore Museum (1977), Sikh Portraits by European Artists (1979), Aitchison College - The First Hundred Years 1886 - 1986 (1986), Lahore - Illustrated Views of the Nineteenth Century (1993), Historical Images of Pakistan (1994), The Armless Queen and Other Essays (1994) and Rare Maps of Pakistan (2000).  

Between November 2007 and April 2008, Aijazuddin was a member of the interim Punjab cabinet. He served as Punjab's Minister for Culture, Tourism and Environment.  

The tribute article says:  

"In 1991, India faced a serious economic crisis. PM P.V. Narasimha Rao made Manmohan Singh his finance minister, allowing him free rein. Singh repaid that confidence by revitalising India’s stagnant economy. Manmohan Singh — a bearded, turbanned Moses — led his Indians out of their economic wilderness.

Like Winston Churchill in 1945 who won the war but lost the election, the Congress party (Manmohan Singh’s political alma mater) won the war against backwardness but lost the 1996 general election. 

Singh became leader of the opposition in India’s Rajya Sabha from 1998 to 2004, confronting but rarely clashing with PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

It was during these days that I met Dr Manmohan Singh. We shared a platform in 2001 with PM Vajpayee and Khushwant Singh to commemorate the bicentenary of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s coronation. He invited me to tea and we spent a couple of hours the following day (a Sunday) discussing art, regional politics, and Sikh history."

"Although Mrs Sonia Gandhi was wary of making any overt gestures of reconciliation with Pakistan, she did not obstruct the back-channel initiative Dr Singh pursu­­ed, using Satish Lambah to talk behind closed doors with Gen Pervez Mushar­raf’s nominee Tariq Aziz. 

Shri Lambah later mentioned that PM Narendra Modi, immediately upon being sworn in as Dr Singh’s successor, summoned Lambah not once but three times for a private briefing on the Indo-Pak back-channel. 

That interaction, and later Modi’s ‘unscheduled’ visit to Raiwind in 2015 to meet PM Nawaz Sharif, were perhaps the two significant occasions in India’s and Pakistan’s fractious history when the dove of peace came closest to being airborne.

Since then, these two countries have followed different and differing trajectories. India is on its way to becoming a developed country, and a potential regional competitor to China. By comparison, Pakistan’s sta­t­ure owes more to the height of China’s sho­ulders than to its own pigmy pretensions.

Dr Manmohan Singh’s legacy to India, like Mrs Margaret Thatcher’s gift to the United Kingdom, has been economic liberalism, the nirvana that comes from unshackled free enterprise. 

His other bequest to India was his example of altruistic leadership. 

By remaining true to himself when others were less true to him, he demonstrated that he could change India without letting India change him."  

Tanvi Dev : Exhibition of 1965 India-Pakistan war, Delhi