VP’s Mandal unleashed a storm that catapulted Lalu, Mulayam and Mayawati to the centre stage of politics
NEW DELHI: Former prime minister VP Singh died on Thursday after battling cancer for the last 17 years. The 77-year-old former scion of the Manda estate near Allahabad, died in his hospital bed at Apollo in Delhi after battling cancer, kidney failure and a heart condition.
The Raja of Manda, as he was called, spent the last few years of his life in hospital, coping with multiple health problems. He began his political career as a typical Gandhi family acolyte in the Congress party. He was handpicked by Sanjay Gandhi as chief minister of Uttar Pradesh and later went to become finance minister and defence minister in the Rajiv Gandhi cabinet at the centre, till he fell out with Rajiv over the Bofors issue.
However it was during his stint outside the Congress that he carved a niche for himself.
He formed the Jan Morcha, an amalgam of disgruntled Congressmen, and later became the pivot around which the opposition came together to dethrone the Congress and give a non-Congress coalition supported by the Left and the BJP from outside, at the Centre.
He became PM in 1989 with help from two of the most unlikely political forces in the country, the BJP and the Left. Both parties supported his 11-month government from the outside, till the BJP withdrew support following LK Advani’s arrest during his Somnath-Ayodhya rath yatra.
VP Singh’s decision to implement the Mandal commission recommendations made him highly unpopular with the upper castes. But the decision also brought about a seismic shift in power equations in the Hindi heartland. As a result of the political upheaval, the likes of Lalu Prasad, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Mayawati were suddenly catapulted from the periphery to an integral part of India’s ruling elite.
For somebody who was instrumental in breaking the back of the Congress in its bastions of UP and Bihar, in the last years of his life VP Singh did everything he possibly could to help the party. He made no secret of his affection for his old party or its current president, Sonia Gandhi.
The one thing about VP Singh the politician is his unimpeachable financial integrity. Even his critics and detractors cannot point a finger at his probity. Singh had a deep sense of righteousness and honour when it came to money. He was alone in the Indian political class who has kept his hands clean where it mattered most.
j_ansari@dnaindia.net
