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Yashwant Sinha cannot be faulted if he has not heard of Lord Mancroft. He would, however, find a study of Lord Jowitt very instructive. In 1929, Sir William Jowitt was elected to the House of Commons as a Liberal. Many of his colleagues had moved to Labour. So did he, five days after the polls, to become Attorney-General in the Labour Government. He promptly resigned his seat, fought a byelection two months later, and won. By the standards of Indian politics in recent years, he was a saint. Intimates knew of his left-wing sympathies. But the odium of sudden and unexplained conversion was not dispelled by the resignation and the byelection. A Bill he piloted in the Commons to provide relief to the jobless defined "an unemployed" as "one genuinely seeking work". Lloyd George drowned the House in laughter when he remarked that it was a fitting description of the Attorney-General.
Twenty-one years later, in February 1950, now a highly respected Lord Chancellor, Lord Jowitt, entered the Lords' dining room and sat with some young peers. He informed them that a general election had been announced adding that their future was brighter than his. He might lose his job and his flat. Lord Mancroft thereupon remarked in an audible aside to his neighbour: "I wonder whether there is any room in the vicarage at Bray."
It is such intolerance of political opportunism - however unjustly expressed in this case - which sustains the British parliamentary system on which ours is modelled. Had we so principled an approach, Ajit Singhs would have been out of business - and Yashwant Sinha would not have risen to the dizzy heights, collapse from which he finds hard to endure and accept. He defected twice over in 1990 and in 1993; this time to the Bharatiya Janata Party, which he had roundly denounced a few months earlier.
The memoir purports to be an account of his two terms as Finance Minister under different regimes (1990-91 and 1998-2003). But the book ranges way beyond his record as Finance Minister to cover his political career; notably, as Leader of Opposition in the Bihar Assembly facing, day after day, the withering ridicule of Chief Minister Lalu Prasad, his prime bete noir. But his ire is reserved for Dr. Manmohan Singh. The very first chapter entitled "The original Reformer?" is written to place himself on the pedestal in the Doctor's place. The question mark is far more appropriate than the author suspects.
Another target is Jaswant Singh, another imagined rival. A member of the Indian Administrative Service, Yashwant Sinha served as Principal Secretary to two Chief Ministers of Bihar. Had he but bridled his ambition, he might well have ended as a senior and respected bureaucrat at the Centre. But ambition, unbridled by sense or scruple, has proved to be his undoing. Instead he became, as the memoir records sotto voce, an object of distrust and, worse, derision.
He does not tell us what visions he saw that inspired him to leave the bureaucracy for politics. Chandra Shekhar did not seduce him. Yashwant Sinha became his enthusiastic Sancho Panza at a time when the Master's intrigues against V.P. Singh stank to high heavens. In 1989, the Janata Dal formed a Government at the Centre headed by V.P. Singh. "As general secretary of the Janata Dal, its main spokesperson, in-charge of its central office and its chief campaign manager, I played a very important role in the victory of the party in the elections of 1989. Unfortunately, while most of my colleagues who worked alongside me were appointed as Cabinet Ministers by V.P. Singh, he decided to offer me the post of a state (junior) Minister. This was a deliberate snub to Chandra Shekhar and his followers in the party. The offer was not acceptable to me and I walked away from the swearing-in ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan" (page 3). He had joined the Janata Party in 1984 and wanted to be Minister in 1989 overriding the claims of partymen who had remained in the wilderness.
It was a tidal wave of popular opposition to the Congress which swept the Janata Dal to power. A newcomer that he was, Yashwant Sinha was too small a fry to claim to have "played a very important role in the victory" (emphasis added, throughout). Other Janata Dal leaders were far more popular and prominent in the party.
Over 200 pages later (page 232), we find that the situation was no better even a decade later when he was a Finance Minister in the Vajpayee Cabinet. "While Vajpayee might have promised me that support, and even extended it to me unflinchingly, the fact remains that there were people within the party who were unhappy with me as Finance Minister. They probably felt that since I was a comparative newcomer to the party, having joined it only in 1993, I should not have been made one of the more senior Ministers of the government.
"I have no hesitation in accepting that my political profile within the party did not justify the allocation of the Finance portfolio to me. In the Chandra Shekhar government I had no such problem, because I was a close confidant of Chandra Shekhar. I was also politically important within my own party. I was the leader of my party in the Rajya Sabha and by virtue of that, the Leader of the House. As such, I did not suffer from the sense of political inadequacy that I felt when I was made Finance Minister in 1998." But in the united Janata Dal he was very much a small fry.
The earlier importance he claimed was attached to his position in the rump, the Samajwadi Janata Dal, which Chandra Shekhar set up after splitting with the Janata Dal in 1990 and "because I was a close confidant of Chandra Shekhar". When you leave public service for politics, you cannot rise except on the shoulders of a popular leader. Yashwant Sinha rose on the shoulders of two such leaders, Chandra Shekhar and L.K. Advani. He was to forsake both eventually.
Chandra Shekhar split the party after a tacit understanding with Rajiv Gandhi and became Prime Minister in November 1990. Yashwant Sinha was now assured of a Cabinet post. Amazingly, his "own preference was for the Ministry of External Affairs". Pray, why? For, nothing in his career had groomed him for that post. Glamour was the only attraction. "But Chandra Shekhar was keen that I take the Finance portfolio, in view of the gathering economic crisis. As a result, External Affairs went to V.C. Shukla and I became the Finance Minister."
"I was familiar with economic issues. I had studied economics at the intermediate level (the first two years of college in those days in a four-year degree course). I must confess, however, that I did not care much for the subject at that stage and had given it up after two years, in favour of history. I graduated in history and chose political science for my master's. Later in my career as an IAS officer, I worked in three important economic Ministries — Commerce, Industry and what was then the Ministry of Shipping and Transport. I was also posted as First Secretary in Bonn and later Consul General in Frankfurt to look after commercial and economic work, in the early 1970s. I realised that economic work was far more interesting than any other work in Government." Why, then, did he ask for the Ministry of External Affairs in 1990 and also a decade later?
As Indira Gandhi did to another defector, Charan Singh, in 1979, so did Rajiv Gandhi to Chandra Shekhar in 1991 — he withdrew the Congress' support and forced a mid-term election to the Lok Sabha. "We won only five seats out of 543." We learn that among the "several emissaries who shuttled" between Chandra Shekhar and Rajiv Gandhi was "T.N. Seshan, who had already been appointed the Chief Election Commissioner". Disclosure of this gross impropriety should cause no surprise to anyone who followed Yashwant Sinha's earlier record.
OUT OF SORTS
Unemployed as a Rajya Sabha member, Yashwant Sinha felt out of sorts. Attempts were made to reunite the Janata Dal. "The party had to look for a future for itself. The responsibility fell largely on Chandra Shekhar to ensure that we, his followers, still had a place under the political sun. The Janata Dal, like the Janata Party earlier, had come unstuck and broken up into its various constituents. The Chandra Shekhar faction was the first to break away. This was followed by the Ajit Singh faction. In 1993, as important assembly elections were round the corner, fresh attempts were made to reunite the three factions of the Janata Dal. Chandra Shekhar nominated me, along with Om Prakash Chautala, to negotiate the terms of the merger. The other negotiators were Sunil Shastri and Rasheed Masood on behalf of Ajit Singh, and S. Jaipal Reddy, Sharad Yadav and I. K. Gujral on behalf of the original Janata Dal. We had a few meetings at the residence of I. K. Gujral. I was unhappy with the attitude of some of my erstwhile colleagues. I also had serious reservations about merging with a party which was increasingly being dominated by Laloo Yadav who, as Chief Minister of Bihar, had used his rustic style to create a larger than life image for himself. He completely dominated the proceedings when the unity conference was held and treated everyone as his subordinate."
Now, read this: "I remember telling Chandra Shekhar in a party meeting earlier in Haridwar that if the party had to make compromises in order to survive in politics, each one of us should be allowed to make our individual compromises instead of being forced into a collective compromise." He was kissing Chandra Shekhar off since he had no future. That explains what followed. It bears quotation in extenso.
"A common friend, who was keen that I join the BJP, had in the meanwhile arranged a meeting with L. K. Advani. Over lunch, Advani and I discussed a number of issues but the question of my joining the BJP was brought up neither by him nor by me.
"Things continued to drift until a chance encounter with Laloo Yadav. I was flying to Delhi from Ranchi, via Patna, with my wife. At Patna airpot there was a flurry of activity. We were informed that preparations were being made for Laloo Yadav to board the flight. Laloo Yadav entered the aircraft like a monarch of all he surveyed. He glanced at me but refused to show any sign of recognition. Even while alighting at Delhi airport, when we stood side by side, he deliberately ignored me. His behaviour confirmed my worst fears about him. Whatever little possibility had remained of my returning to the Janata Dal evaporated that day. I made up my mind. Even my personal loyalty to Chandra Shekhar could now not persuade me to join the Janata Dal or stop me from going ahead with my plans.
"As soon as I reached home, I rang up Advani and requested him for an urgent meeting. He said he was on his way to some election meetings and would contact me either late that evening or early the next morning. He phoned me at around 5-30 a.m. the next day to inquire if I could see him then. He was about to catch a flight out of Delhi and would be back only a few days later. I thanked him and told him that I could wait for a few days and we could meet when he returned. When he did, I told him that I had decided to join his party. The rest was up to him. The issue was handled expeditiously by Advani and I joined the BJP on 13 November 1993. We had just celebrated Diwali, and Advani described me as a Diwali gift to the BJP. A chance encounter had once again determined an important part of my life — my political future. But for it, I may have continued to drift for some more time."
Thus, on his own admission so it was a mere "chance encounter", a snub by Lalu Prasad, that drove him to join the BJP. What if Lalu had hugged Yashwant Sinha, instead? Would history have taken a different course? And was "personal loyalty to Chandra Shekhar" the only restraining factor? What about his conscience? His commitment to values? All were abandoned no sooner a promising vista of personal advancement was opened.
TIRADE AGAINST THE BJP
For less than a year earlier, he had, in a lengthy article in The Sunday Observer of December 14, 1992, written in the wake of the demolition of the Babri Masjid on December 6, 1992, called the BJP names, reproached secular forces for contributing to its rise, and called them now to unite to meet the challenge. This document written by one of the "stalwarts" of our politics is reproduced in a box. These brief extracts are quoted in context: "Somehow, the non-Congress centrist secular parties never mustered the self-confidence in their struggle against the Congress to keep away from the BJP and go to the people on their own. This mistake was made in 1977 and repeated in 1989.... But alas, we were not conscious of our own strength either in 1977 or in 1989 and carried the BJP on our shoulders from strength to strength... .
"Religious fanaticism soon became the declared electoral platform of the BJP. The capture of power in UP led it to believe that it could capture power at the Centre also by the same tactics. It is at it with full vigour... . India is being pushed back into the dark ages by obscurantist, fundamentalist and fascist forces... . Their appeasement... has today given them the strength and the audacity to seek to destroy the very basis of our nation state. This is the gravest and most formidable challenge before us... the secular forces will have to unitedly and determinedly meet this challenge if India is to survive as a democratic, secular, progressive, liberal and modern nation."
Nine months later he joined hands with these very "obscurantist fundamentalist and fascist forces"; according to him after a mere "chance encounter". His own confession is damning enough and tells us everything about the man. Others have a different explanation, however, it was as dramatic as St. Paul's on the road to Damascus. But it was not out of conviction unlike the Saint's. Yashwant Sinha himself does not claim a change of ideology.
When a far greater man, Sir John Simon, left the Liberals to sit on the Tory Benches, Lloyd George remarked: "Mr. Speaker, there have been many honourable and right honourable gentlemen greater than the right honourable gentleman who have crossed the floor of this House and have done so out of conviction. But never has an honourable or right honourable gentleman crossed it before and left behind him such a slimy trail." That slime and its foul smell will never desert the name of Yashwant Sinha as long as he lives.
At the All-Party Committee on Defections, headed by Union Home Minister Y.B. Chavan, Madhu Limaye proposed that no political party should accept a defector. Advani had no such qualms. It is unlikely that he reminded Yashwant Sinha of his article and of J. P. Kemble's immortal lines: "Perhaps it was right to dissemble your love. But why did you kick me downstairs"?
Advani recruited Yashwant Sinha and nursed him. It is to Advani that Yashwant Sinha turned whenever he needed help. In 2005 after the BJP had lost power, he turned against Advani in his hour of distress over the Jinnah comments - Advani should resign as Leader of the Opposition since he had resigned as BJP president and complete his humiliation.
In 1995 again it was Advani who decided that Yashwant Sinha should give battle to Lalu Prasad in the Bihar Assembly polls. He did. But Chief Minister Lalu Prasad was returned by an absolute majority.
Yashwant Sinha resigned his seat on the hawala issue in 1996 and "followed our conscience". The BJP and allies won a majority in the 1998 Lok Sabha polls. "I learnt from the media that the Prime Minister and his Cabinet were likely to take the oath of office on March 19. I waited for word from the party regarding my inclusion in the Cabinet. But there was no call from anyone in Delhi. Govindacharya did speak to me over the phone on the morning of March 18 and asked me to come to Delhi. But his call could not be taken as an authoritative invitation. Although unsure, I decided to go to Delhi that day nonetheless. After reaching Delhi around 10 p.m., I asked my wife if either Vajpayee or Advani had called. There had been no call, she told me. It was a scene straight out of Yes Minister, the popular BBC serial. Clearly, I was not going to be a part of the new Cabinet. Within half an hour of coming to this conclusion, I got the all-important call from Advani." A vastly relieved Yashwant Sinha became Finance Minister, at long last.
The candour about the desperate yearning for a minister's job is delightful. It explains the repeated conversions. He now had to deal with the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), which had vetoed Jaswant Singh's appointment as Minister. "In earlier years I had participated in various programmes organised by the RSS to promote the concept of swadeshi."
The entire book dwells on his achievements as a financial wizard. "And one of my parliamentary colleagues said, `If you sat back with your eyes closed during the early part of Mr. Sinha's speech, it could well have been Mrs. Gandhi holding forth'." But it is Yashwant Sinha's political career which is of greater interest. Few, if any, considered him a success as Finance Minister; certainly not the Prime Minister.
"I am a strong nationalist, and a staunch believer in swadeshi. Therefore, I associated myself happily and whole-heartedly with the swadeshi movement after joining the BJP. In fact, I had gone round the country in 1994 propagating swadeshi on behalf of the Swadeshi Jagran Manch, a body set up by the RSS to promote swadeshi. Before we came into government, RSS and BJP leaders used to meet regularly to discuss economic issues. While we had a wide area of convergence, there were some issues on which we differed even then. I consulted RSS leaders before I finalised the 1998 budget. They expected me to prepare a swadeshi budget."
It did not help. "Perhaps what was most distressing during my tenure in the Finance Ministry was the opposition I sometimes faced from my own colleagues within the party. This opposition was most pronounced in the BJP parliamentary party. The worst part was that these discussions did not remain confidential; they became public and were highlighted in the media; and the impression gained ground that I did not enjoy the confidence of the entire party."
The BJP and the RSS have shown, time and again, their disdain and distrust of the technocrat who did not fully share their ideology. Two noted lawyers who rushed ardently to join the BJP in 1980 got nowhere; as did two noted colleagues of Rajiv Gandhi. All fell by the wayside; none pities them now.
After the 2001 Budget Yashwant Sinha decided to renew his old troth for the Ministry of External Affairs, after a lapse of a decade. He spoke to Brajesh Mishra and N.K. Singh. "But I received a telephone call from Vajpayee. He told me that I was doing a good job as Finance Minister and therefore there was no question of my shifting to any other Ministry. If I had any such thoughts, I should give them up. There now seemed no point in my discussing this idea with anyone else. I do not know how the Prime Minister got to know that Brajesh Mishra and I were meeting to discuss this matter. I thought Brajesh Mishra might have informed him of my plan, but when Brajesh arrived, he said that he had not talked to the Prime Minister at all on this matter. We both agreed that there was no point in pursuing the matter further. It dawned on me once again how extremely well informed the Prime Minister generally was." This is laboured sarcasm.
JAYALALITHAA'S ENVELOPE
Vajpayee had his own wondrous ways in which to perform. A shocking incident, recorded at page 236, deserves probe. Significantly Yashwant Sinha mentions this incident of 1998 immediately after recording the contretemps of 2001. Yashwant Sinha writes, tongue fairly in cheek, about Vajpayee's omniscience: "The first time I had a taste of this was after a meeting with Jayalalitha sometime towards the end of 1998. I had not had an occasion to meet her after I took over as Finance Minister. Janardanan, an MP from her party who worked with me as Minister of State, informed me one day that `Madam' was very keen to meet me. Could I make a trip to Chennai to see her? I agreed to meet her when I went to Chennai next. I knew that my meeting with Jayalalithaa, against whom there were so many revenue cases, would be publicised out of proportion. I was not at all keen on that kind of publicity."
He consulted Vajpyee who said, "I should meet her". Meet her, he did. Present at the lunch were only three guests - Janardanan, Dilip Ray, Minister of State for Coal, and Yashwant Sinha. "As I was about to leave, Jayalalitha handed me an envelope. Later, when I opened it, I found it was a note about her income tax cases. I did not act on the note because as a policy I did not interfere in such cases. I met the Prime Minister a few days later and reported the details of my meeting with Jayalalitha in Chennai, but forgot to mention the envelope. After I had finished my narration, Vajpayee innocently asked me about the envelope she had given me and its contents. I was taken aback. Obviously, the Prime Minister of India gets to know everything, if he so wishes. Is it a matter of surprise, then, that Vajpayee came to know about my meeting with Brajesh Mishra and the subject we were going to discuss?"
Yashwant Sinha is being too clever by half. Mishra was Vajpayee's confidant as he well knew. Not so Jayalalithaa. Yashwant Sinha professes to attribute omniscience to Vajpayee while insinuating clearly that Vajpayee and Jayalalithaa were in touch with each other. He met her at the Prime Minister's instance and Vajpayee could have come to know of the envelope only from his ally Jayalalithaa herself. The insinuation is all too obvious. Yashwant Sinha is willing to wound but is afraid to strike - Vajpayee wanted Yashwant Sinha to help Jayalalithaa, he insinuates. The deviousness is revolting. It is his parting shot at yet another benefactor.
Yashwant Sinha's genuflexions before the RSS were of no avail. "One reason for my unhappiness in the Finance Ministry was that I had lost the confidence of the Swadeshi Jagran Manch and the RSS, with whom I had worked so closely earlier in the swadeshi movement. I was always of the view that we should take them into confidence, have discussions with them and explain why we had done what we had. I had no doubt in my mind that our explanations would have removed their doubts and satisfied them, but the meetings could not take place regularly due to lack of time. Thus there was a widening communication gap between then and us. In fact, the misunderstanding became so serious that Dattopant Thengdi, one of the senior-most leaders of the RSS, known as the patron saint of swadeshi, went to the extent of calling me an apraadhi (culprit) in a public meeting in Delhi in April 2001. He described how I had deviated from the path of swadeshi after I had become Finance Minister."
He now pressed for the Ministry of External Affairs. "Since Jaswant Singh was doing a fine job and had built-up personal rapport with leaders the world over, Vajpayee was not in favour of shifting him from external affairs." But since Jaswant Singh was such a smashing success, why on earth did Yashwant Sinha try to grab his job? Rebuffed by Vajpayee, Yashwant Sinha went to Advani. He sensed that he was going to be shifted.
"If I had to be shifted and still be retained as a Minister the only portfolio I would like to handle was External Affairs. Advani was sympathetic and assured me that he would try his best for me.
"Towards the end of June 2002, I got a telephone call from Vajpayee in my office in North Block, asking me to meet him... . "Vajpayee started the conversation by saying that I was doing a good job in the Finance Ministry, but the public perception was unfortunately different. As public perception had to be taken note of, he had decided to shift me from the Ministry of Finance... . A few days later, the changes in portfolios were formally announced. I was shifted to External Affairs and Jaswant Singh to Finance. I was happy because I had got what I wanted. My only regret was that I was shifted because the `perception' about my tenure in the Finance Ministry was not favourable about me. Perhaps a lot of people were glad that I had finally left charge as Finance Minister."
He blames all and sundry for his plight - "those out there in Mumbai and other places." He became Minister for External Affairs and went about declaiming loudly day in and day out; all to prove he was more patriotic than his predecessor. He repeatedly threatened Pakistan with a pre-emptive attack, having himself launched a highly successful pre-emptive attack on the Hindutva bandwagon in 1993 just as it began to roll.
To be fair to him, unlike Jaswant Singh, Yashwant Sinha read the files; did not slight professionals; nor play favourites. Despite his limitations and his tunnel vision, officials at the Ministry of External Affairs preferred the industrious mediocrity to the bombastic humbug.
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