PM Modi should exercise restraint, set an example: Manmohan Singh

NEW DELHI: The quality of political discourse in the country has hit rock bottom, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Monday, even as he urged his successor Narendra Modi to exercise ‘due restraint that is becoming of a Prime Minister’.


Singh was responding to questions at the release of Congress leader and former Union minister Manish Tewari’s book ‘Fables of Fractured Times’. He said, “My advise to the Prime Minister is to exercise due restraint that is becoming of a Prime Minister....He is the Prime Minister of all Indians. His conduct must be worthy and consistent with the obligation he has as PM.”

Singh also asserted that he and the UPA government did not discriminate in the way the Modi dispensation was playing partisan with the non-BJP ruled states. “We never discriminated against the BJP-ruled states. Shivraj Singhji would himself testify to this. We paid the respect the state deserved,” he said, adding that Modi should set an example.

The former PM also said terror had no purpose, emphasising friendly relations between India and Pakistan is the only way forward. Remembering the November 26 terror attacks in Mumbai, he also said he was hopeful “saner elements” will prevail in both countries.

Highlighting the great churn in international affairs, Singh said, “Countries which once championed the cause of globalisation are now championing the cause of protectionism. Nobody could have imagined that Britain would walk away from the European Union.”

Speaking at the event, former J&K CM Farooq Abdullah also lamented the declining standards of political discourse in the country and said the Congress, rather than the BJP-led NDA, should have conferred the Bharat Ratna on late former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. “Ram doesn’t need my vote nor does Allah need our vote. The elections are not being fought on developmental issues,” he said.

Abdullah also urged people to trust Indian Muslims. “Do not mistrust Indian Muslims. We are a part of this land. We have never taken directions from Pakistan. We decided not to participate in the elections because they (BJP) were playing with Article 370 and 35A,” he said.