Mukherjee as Prime Minister

The country is abuzz with the impending presidential elections. This is an indirect election in which only the members of the parliament and state legislatures vote as people’s representatives. Yet, every five years many interested citizens and the media come out with names of potential presidential candidates, besides the names thrown up by the political leaders. This is a healthy sign of our maturity as a democratic republic. As Chester Bowles says, “government is too big and important to be left to the politicians.”

This year many interesting names have come up before the nation, the more outstanding among them being former President A P J Abdul Kalam, current Vice President Hamid Ansari, Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar, former Governor of West Bengal Gopalkrishna Gandhi, celebrity scholar Karan Singh, and currently the front-runner Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee. Each of them is eminent and worthy of occupying the high office of the President of the Republic. There are other names being floated by politicians to suit their own interests. But they lack ratings and popularity. 

We are living in a time of leadership crisis. There are leaders galore but very few who are accepted by large sections of people in all the regions of the country. However, the search for President has shown that there is atleast one candidate who finds acceptability and respect from across the board:  Pranab Mukherjee. While various leaders from different political parties support the idea of having Mukherjee occupy the Rashtrapati Bhavan, his own Congress party is maintaining a prolonged silence. Yeshwant Sinha of Bharatiya Janata Party has gone on record  complimenting Mukherjee and wishing him well during the recent concluding discussion on the budget.

The question of putting up Mukherjee as presidential candidate is much more difficult than it seems. He is the key minister in the Union Cabinet. The government, the UPA, and the Congress party require his negotiating and leadership skills more than those of any other minister. He has vast and varied experience, having served as minister right from the time of late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and having held a wide range of portfolios from finance and commerce to external affairs. Besides being the chief troubleshooter in times of crisis, and the dexterous negotiator in difficult circumstances, he is the leader of the Lok Sabha with forty years experience as a parliamentarian. Of the thirty-seven groups of ministers that operate within the government deliberating on policy and implementation, Mukherjee is heading twenty-four and is part of all eleven empowered groups. With all these responsibilities at the age of seventy-six, Mukerjee is a picture of sagacity and calmness.  Not smeared by scandal. And though he may have expresssed his willingness to retire from active politics, those who believe in his potentialities know that the best is yet to be…

It is ofcourse a compliment to be endorsed for president by political parties other than his own. But just from the devil’s advocate point of view, could the move to make him the nominal Head of State be motivated by the desire to deprive the UPA government of its most valuable asset? If true, and I hope it is not, it is a smart political manoeuvre but not the best  for the nation.

In my opinion, the nation needs Mukherjee. Not as President, but as the Prime Minister of India. It is the Prime Minister who runs the country. The President is only the ceremonial head of state. There are many candidates, besides the ones listed above, who would be very suitable  for the post of the President.

It is a delicate situation no doubt. We have an incumbent Prime Minister who has another two years to go. But he has been there for the last eight years. A good man, an epitome of gentleness and personal integrity. But he does not have the political instinct. He has never won an election, and may not be feeling the pulse of the people. It is sad that in the year we are observing sixty years of parliamentary democracy in India, we have a prime minister who has never been a member of the Lok Sabha. I think he has given his best in the areas of his competence, but has not emerged as the leader of the nation.

The Congress and  the UPA have to see the writing on the wall. They owe it to the people to give the nation the best. If they hold on to the present, they will lose the future. But if they make bold moves now and make course corrections, the people may give them another chance. And if the Congress and UPA give us at this juncture a strong, experienced, intelligent and imaginative Prime Minister, then we may have a better tomorrow. No one suits the bill better than Pranab Mukherjee.

Published in The Navhind Times, Panorama 20.05.2012