Seeds of Congress decline sown during Rao's tenure: Chidambaram

It was during the tenure of former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao that the "seeds of Congress party's decline were sown", former Union Minister and Congress leader P. Chidambaram said here on Tuesday.

Chidambaram, who served as a minister in Rao's cabinet, said the former Prime Minister "committed several mistakes but seldom admitted to them".

"Every time I went and told him that you have committed a mistake, his pet reply would be 'I'll tell you one day why I did what I did' ... But that day never came," Chidambaram said at the launch of a book on Narasimha Rao here.

The former Finance Minister said Rao indeed provided the political will and leadership needed to usher in the famous economic reforms of 1991, but it was Manmohan Singh who, as Rao's Finance Minister, brought the "intellectual heft" to the reform process.

The book "1991: How P.V. Narasimha Rao made History" by veteran journalist Sanjaya Baru, gives a detailed account of the political and economic churning of 1991 when India reached the brink of defaulting on foreign debts, and praises Rao for deftly steering the country away from that unprecedented crisis.

However, Chidambaram took exception to certain observations in the book.

He said that even Rajiv Gandhi, had he been alive and at the helm, would have pursued the same economic policy.

"I have no doubt in my mind if Rajiv Gandhi would have become the Prime Minister -- which he would have in all probability -- he would have done what P.V. (Narasimha Rao) did.

"I am convinced Rajiv Gandhi would have done more or less the same things with more or less the same team," Chidambaram said.

--IANS

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