Veteran Congress leader Arjun Singh dies aged 81

Veteran Congress politician Arjun Singh, who had a long and chequered career as chief minister of Madhya Pradesh and, later, as Union minister, died here today after a long illness.

Singh (81), who was admitted to the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences some days ago with chest pain and neurological problems, complained of breathing problem around 5:30pm. He then suffered a heart attack and died at about 6:15pm, a source said.

Incidentally, Singh was dropped just today from the party's highest policy-making body, the Congress Working Committee, and made a permanent invitee.

Singh leaves behind wife Saroj Kumari, two sons — Ajay Singh, an MLA in Madhya Pradesh and Abhimanyu — and daughter Veena.

A loyalist of the Gandhi family and considered a shrewd strategist, Singh was chief minister of Madhya Pradesh from 1980 to 1985. He was made governor of Punjab just a day after he took oath as chief minister of what was then India's largest state for the second time.

Singh became governor at the height of the terrorist campaign in Punjab and helped the young Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi reach an accord with Akali Dal leader Sant Harchand Singh Longowal. The pact came to be known as the Rajiv-Longowal peace accord. Longowal was later murdered by terrorists and the peace deal came unstuck.

Singh held prestigious portfolios at the Centre as commerce and communications minister under Rajiv Gandhi in the 1980s and human resources development minister under PV Narasimha Rao in the 1990s.

A leader who swore by secular ideals, Singh turned against Narasimha Rao in the aftermath of the Babri Masjid demolition in December 1992. Though he did not resign from the government immediately, he later parted ways with Narasimha Rao and formed a rebel Congress under the leadership of former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Narain Dutt Tiwari in 1994.

Singh, who was vice-president of the Congress under Rajiv Gandhi, rejoined the party after Narasimha Rao quit as party president. He spearheaded the campaign for the ouster of DMK ministers in the United Front government in 1997 over the Jain Commission report into the conspiracy behind the murder of Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.

The United Front government led by Inder Kumar Gujral fell in the face of the campaign.

Singh was a close adviser to Sonia Gandhi when she decided to enter politics and became Congress president in 1998.  He was said to have been behind her unsuccessful attempt to become prime minister after the fall of the 13-month-old Atal Bihari Vajpayee government in April 1999.

Gandhi staked her claim to form the government claiming the support of 272 MPs, but ultimately she did not have the numbers.

But the political wheel turned full circle when Singh lost his proximity to Sonia Gandhi and that may have played a part in his failing to realise his prime ministerial ambitions.

However, as HRD minister in the first United Progressive Alliance government from 2004, Singh was instrumental in championing the cause of
the backward classes and piloted bills for ensuring reservation for them in institutions of excellence.

With failing health, Singh, who had begun using a wheelchair in the last couple of years, did not make it to the Union cabinet when Manmohan Singh took oath as prime minister for a second time.

But his strong loyalty to the Gandhi family came into prominence when he made a rare appearance in the Rajya Sabha last year to blame the late Narasimha Rao for letting Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson leave India. Narasimha Rao headed the Union home ministry in 1984, when the Bhopal gas tragedy took place.

Born in Churhat in Sidhi district of Madhya Pradesh in November 1930, Singh studied law and entered politics to become a member of the state assembly in 1957 where he continued till 1985.

During his political career, he came under a cloud over what came to be known as the Churhat lottery scandal during his tenure as chief minister.

Singh became minister of state for agriculture in Madhya Pradesh in 1963 and rose steadily. He was leader of the opposition from 1977 to 1980 when the Janata Party broke the Congress monopoly on power in the Hindi heartland after the Emergency.

At the national level in the party, Singh was a member of the CWC and the Congress parliamentary board. When elections were held for the working committee at the All-India Congress Committee session in Tirupati in 1992, Singh won by the highest margin of votes.

When CWC elections took place again in Kolkata in 1997, Singh again won his place in the committee.

In his last days, Singh was busy writing his autobiography titled A Grain Of Sand In The Hourglass Of Time, which he planned to release shortly. There was speculation that the Congress veteran, who never shied away from controversy, would have raised a few more in his book.

Union ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia, Kamalnath and Virbhadra Singh visited Singh's residence to meet the bereaved family.

Senior Congress politicians like Motilal Vora, Janardhan Dwivedi and Ghulam Nabi Azad visited the AIIMS, where Singh died.

A source said Singh's body would be taken to his official residence at 17, Akbar Road in the morning.

His last rites are likely to be performed at his hometowm
Churhat in Madhya Pradesh, the source said.