1991: How P. V. Narasimha Rao Made History

by Sanjaya Baru

Indira Gandhi’s time. She was the author of the so-called ‘licence-permit raj’, of sweeping nationalization, including of foreign companies, and restrictions on the growth of firms with a view to curbing the ‘concentration of economic power’, as it was described.

Nehruvianism, so to speak, was represented by three pillars: self-reliance, a mixed economy and non-alignment.

PV became famous for the statement attributed to him: ‘Not taking a decision is also a decision’.

Second, the swing in favour of the Congress after 20 May was mainly on account of a sharp rise in the votes cast by women, Muslims, Scheduled Castes and Backward Classes—the traditional support base of the Indira Congress. This fact suggests that traditional Congress voters had not felt enthused enough to come out in large numbers and vote for Rajiv Gandhi on the first phase of polling. It is only after his assassination that they ventured out and voted in large numbers in favour of the Congress. The sympathy wave was also more pronounced in peninsular India than in the Gangetic Plain.

Younger leaders like Pawar, Arjun Singh, Madhavrao Scindia and many more could imagine, without being expelled from the party, that if PV could be prime minister, maybe they could aspire to succeed him. That is how normal political parties renew themselves—by giving hope to younger leaders. 1991 was that moment of hope for the Congress.

Dr Singh had offered to quit on at least three occasions in the face of intra-party criticism and each time PV had to get him to withdraw the resignation offer, reminding him that these attacks, mainly from Arjun Singh, A. K. Antony and the Congress left, were in fact aimed at the prime minister.

When PV died, in 2004, Manmohan Singh attended every memorial meeting in New Delhi—the only member of the CWC to do so.

In July 1992, Commerce Minister Chidambaram, one of the ministers Rajiv first drafted into government, offered to quit following allegations of financial impropriety on his part in a matter pertaining to the ownership of shares in Fairgrowth Financial Services, a Bangalore-based company charged with involvement in a stock market scam.

PV wanted the Congress to return to a pre-1966 trajectory, seeking a future independent of any one family. Why should the Congress remain only the ‘Indira Congress’?