TRIPLETS: MMS/SA/GB

TRIPLETS: GORDON BROWN, SHAUKAT AZIZ AND MANMOHAN SINGH

Why have I named these three leaders as Triplets? Hopefully they were not “Three brothers coming from the same mother – famous quote of Subhash Ghai”. Now what is the comparison between the three “greats”? These three have guided the destiny of their countrymen and women by being at the Top of their government. These three have been the most intellectual in their education and manners. They have studied at the best colleges/universities known to the free world; they have an enviable list of batch mates whom they could fall back upon during any problem/crisis. So why have they been such a failures as prime ministers? Let us see one by one on the case history of these three wise men. Let me just add three commonalities between all of them: firstly, none of them were elected or even projected as Prime Minister during the elections, so in a true sense they did not have the peoples mandate to govern, secondly, they were successful as Finance Ministers but big failures as prime ministers and thirdly, during the worst patch of their governance, their own credibility or honesty was not doubted by even the opposition.

Manmohan Singh: Mr. All but Right.

Well he is the man with a Halo ring around him. He has been in true sense Mr. all but right, a man who has governed the biggest democracy in the world by being a yes man for the Turino lady and her family. Whether it was the midnight dismissal of the Bihar government, the sibte rizvi episode in Jharkhand, the de freezing of quatorrochi’s London account, NREG scheme also called the National Loot scheme for congress party, his speech on being sleepless on the arrest of Hanif by the Aussie police but not a word on the death of Indian soldiers fighting the insurgency, his statement that Muslims have the first claim on the countries resources, his statement that he is keeping the P.M seat warm for Rahul baba, Zero economic reforms, stalling the sale of critically sick PSU’s, No national scheme like Vajpayee’s the Highway’s program, PURA initiative, the Rural roads program, Swajal Dhara program, the sale of non strategic PSU’s, the start of the aviation boom, the interlinking of rivers, end to license raj, strengthening of democratic institutions – to put it in a nutshell, no proud moment for our country done by this government. I am still unsure of what Mr. Singh will be remembered for by the future generations – probably he does not care, he has secured for himself and his family some royal treatment like VP Singh or Chandrasekhar or Deve Gowda or IK Gujral did.

Does anyone remember any contributions from them to the country? He has even put his own previous congress P.M to shame by not even backing that dead man when P.V Narsimha Rao’s policies were being blamed by his compatriots in the congress and the voice of china in India – CPI/CPM for all the so called problems of the country.

Now Mr. Singh has launched the farmer debt scheme without any thought on what are the real problems that ailing the farmers. After another 5 years the will be back to zero and another P.M will again start the debit waiver. I was trying to find a list of 5 things that our dear P.M can claim that he has done to make his mark in our countries history but I could only gather one, his Arunachal Pradesh package that really has made people stand up and count him as someone who has a voice, but nothing more.

So behold my country men and women, the night will be over and the sun will shine soon!!

Gordon Brown: Mr. Doubtful

So Gordon Brown has lost or better put the New Labour has lost the council election in England and Wales. Most commentators say that it has been Labour (new labour’s) worst defeat in the last 40 years. So what is common between GB and MMS, well the answer is simple both did well when they were running mates or better put working under someone rather being a leader themselves. Gordon Brown was not the most supportive of the Tony Blair’s stance on different issues but forgot one basic thing, for all the wrong that tony blair stood for – he did back all his cabinet colleagues to the hilt and it was his colleagues who left or deserted him but never him. Gordon Brown was a product of the same thought process. Gordon Brown was backed by Tony Blair to do every possible thing to keep the economy on a high and all this by himself absorbing all entire negative fallouts. Now that situation has changed and he has to stand by his chancellor’s and secretary and by his record he has not done a good job at that. I think it looks something very similar to Mr.MMS. History will surely judge him as one of the best Chancellors of Exchequer and the worst P.M

Shaukat Aziz: Mr I am the only one who is right.

The less said the better. This self professed Alpha male and one on whom women including Condi rice were supposed to fall over. In 2001 he was declared as the “Finance Minister of the Year” by Euro money and Bankers Magazine and as the man who made Pakistan into one of the fastest growing economies of the world. But what has been his record as a P.M – Mr Failure of the Year. Doesn’t that sound too familiar with our other 2 entrants in this list? His biggest failure was not with the economy but the absence of any connect to the ground realities of Pakistan. He never realised that he had moved from just being a team member to being a leader of his team and that too the leader who had to run one of the most difficult countries in the world. His failures at sensing the lurking insurgency in tribal areas, his problems with over dependence on U.S Aid to prop up his economy and his over dependence on use the debit route to finance a perilous economy like Pakistan was even more shocking. What will be remembered as his best moment has been his exit from Pakistan just after the current government was formed; his attitude being let Pakistan go to hell, I am off to London and will try and become the C.E.O of Citibank – something that he lost to Vikram Pandit. He is something like Pay per View channels, came in for 6-7 years and when he was needed around to help his country make the transition, he ran away looking for his plum jobs in Western Corporations.

He somehow shares a strange similarity with L.K Advani, they both are the products of St. Patrick’s High School, Karachi.