Pranab Mukherjee is man for all seasons

JYOTI MALHOTRA

New Delhi, August 29, 2007 : Come hell or high water, the Congress high command knows it can always depend on one man to come to the aid of the party.

So when the high command shot down External Affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee’s name for President a couple of months ago because he was much too ``indispensable’’ to be allowed to semi-retire, no one realised just how true that would turn out to be.

In the wake of the political crisis over the Indo-US nuclear deal currently gripping the government, Mukherjee has become the one man everyone is turning to.

Seconded by both Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi to find a way out of the crisis with the Left parties, Mukherjee has patiently met every top leader from the CPM and the CPI, the RSP and the Forward Bloc, over the last three days.

And when a committee is set up to probe the whys and wherefores of the 123 agreement and the Hyde Act, Mukherjee will be its likely head.

By night, the Congress party’s political managers, Ahmed Patel and Defence minister AK Antony, land up at 13, Talkatora Road, the small white nondescript bungalow in which Mukherjee has lived for years and years. (He is entitled to a much fancier house of course, according to his stature, but he refuses to leave this place.)

Mukherjee’s aides say Patel and Anthony are around almost till the clock strikes midnight. Both know they cannot find a solution to the crisis without Mukherjee’s views on the matter.

``There are no holidays for us. We work on Onam and we work on Raksha Bandhan. We work during the day when Parliament is in session, in the Ministry of External Affairs and outside. Naturally we work on weekends,’’ Mukherjee’s aides said.

In fact, Mukherjee summoned the entire West Bengal Pradesh Congress committee for a meeting at his house a few days ago, a move being interpreted by some political observers as meaning that snap polls will be held sooner than later.

``Everything was discussed in the meeting, including the Indo-US nuclear deal and the Left’s failure to achieve industrialization in Bengal,’’ said sources.

Analysts love to point out that the Congress party’s near-total dependence on `Dada,’as Mukherjee is affectionately called, stems from the fact that he has been in the Congress party longer than any Congressman alive, first appointed minister of state for commerce in Indira Gandhi’s cabinet in the late 60s itself.

``Add to that the fact that he is completely discreet in the old-school mould and you get an unbeatable combination,’’ one politician said.

Mukherjee’s fame as trouble-shooter has in fact spread so far and wide that students from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, upset that Health minister Ambumani Ramadoss has refused to sign their medical degrees for the last couple of years, have taken an appointment to meet him at 10 pm at home tonight.

Only a couple of hours before, Mukherjee met Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes chairman Buta Singh, in connection with the protest by some AIIMS doctors over the selection of senior residents at India’s topmost research institution.

MEA sources pointed out that just because Pranab Mukherjee has become the UPA’s man-for-all-seasons doesn’t mean he slows down on ministry work.

Oman’s ambassador to India was calling on him this evening in connection with the possible visit by his King to India. As soon as the monsoon session of Parliament gets over on September 14, Mukherjee’s booked to travel to South Korea on September 16-17.

Ten days later he will be in New York to attend the UN General Assembly session, and take the rostrum to speak on September 28. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has decided not to go to the UNGA again this year.

As if all this were not enough, there is the matter of the 52 Groups of Ministers (GoMs) to consider. Last night, the GoM on gas pricing wrapped up its work and Petroleum minister Murli Deora is soon expected to announce its results.

Before that the GoM on the merger of Air-India with Indian Airlines had finalized its work, to create the newest corporate entity, Air India, to hit the skies.

Civil Aviation minister Praful Patel is already taking credit for that one.

ENDS