The Compromised Minister

Monday’s decision is being read in political circles, essentially, as a compromise. Officially, as one of the party’s spokespersons Abhishek Manu Singhvi, put it, "There is no concrete evidence yet against Natwar Singh. But since the government has set up an enquiry to examine the findings in the Volcker Report, it did not want there to be any charge of a conflict of interest. Therefore, this is a well-considered decision, a compromise, following a series of discussions."

Unofficially, it is also being read as a compromise, but of a different sort: Natwar Singh’s continuance in the foreign ministry was not just becoming a major embarrassment; his public show of defiance and his reported private threats to party leaders that he would destroy the party if forced to quit compelled the government and party to allow him to remain in the government, even if he no longer holds the portfolio. BJP general secretary Arun Jaitley has described this as blackmail but, for once, he is saying publicly what Congress leaders are saying privately.

Haunted by the nightmare of Bofors, a majority in the Congress – including the Prime Minister and Congress president Sonia Gandhi – had begun to feel, as events unfolded over the last few days, that it would be politically and morally untenable for Natwar Singh to continue as foreign minister unless he was cleared of the charges made in the Volcker report. With revelations of a connection between the minister’s son and Bharatpur MLA Jagat Singh and Andaleeb Sehgal of Hamdaan Exports – an Indian company named in the report – was established, a delighted BJP, going through a political dry spell, plunged into the fray.

Efforts to discount the connection by friends of Natwar Singh – since the source was political maverick and professional Congress baiter Subramaniam Swamy – cut little ice, with Jagat and then his father admitting to a close and long-standing friendship with Sehgal. As a Congress functionary said, "The law may say a man is innocent till he is proved guilty but in the public perception, if a man is perceived as guilty, he is guilty unless he is convincingly proved to be innocent. In politics, it is perception that matters." 

Natwar Singh’s personal conduct also did not help: Privately, he accused party seniors of ganging up against him – party sources say the special objects of his ire included union defence minister Pranab Mukherji, union petroleum minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, party general secretary Ambika Soni (whose effigies were burnt in Bharatpur by Natwar loyalists) and party MP Jairam Ramesh. Publicly, he said repeatedly on television that he saw no reason why he should resign, claimed rather immodestly that he was doing "a good job" as foreign minister, and described Virender Dayal ( the former diplomat who was named to head a fact finding committee on the Volcker Report’s findings on Indian beneficiaries) as being seven years his junior in the IFS – thereby implying that the latter would do what he was told.

Next, his remarks on Iran on the sidelines of a seminar organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry, on November 6 – along with his lobbying Left leaders by portraying himself as anti-American – as an effort toarm-twist the government to retain him as external affairs minister. He told journalists that if the next resolution on the Iran nuclear issue at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) meeting next month was more severe than the previous one, "my advice to the Government would be to reverse its vote." Earlier, inaugurating the seminar, he said: "Let me assure you; nothing will prevent us as a great country from raising our voice as we did when we were in opposition to what was done in Iraq." These remarks were read as playing to the Left gallery and damned him further.

Finally, the fact that he is unpopular in the Congress has not helped – tales of his arrogance are legion. The only factor in his favour was his proximity to Sonia Gandhi – he is one of the very few who addresses the party president by her first name and is regarded not just as a loyalist but as a personal friend. But in the end, when the whisper campaign began that Sonia Gandhi was trying to shield Natwar Singh, he had to go. Party sources say that the party president was "very annoyed at the damage done to the Congress’s image". 

Interestingly, while Natwar Singh stood isolated in his own party (the few who publicly supported him consisted of former Chattisgarh CM Ajit Jogi who has also had "son trouble", union minister Sis Ram Ola and Chaudhury Birender Singh), most of the UPA allies, principally the Left, came out to support him primarily on ideological grounds. The view among the allies is that Natwar Singh has been made a scapegoat by the Volcker Report because of his anti-American stance. 

The run-up to the decision to drop Natwar Singh – for the moment, at least – followed the setting up of the Dayal Committee on November 6, the announcement of a judicial commission under former chief justice RS Pathak who will adjudicate on the facts that the Dayal Committee comes up with and a series of meetings both within party and government. 

Three key meetings led to the final decision. On November 6, the PM held high level consultations with Sonia Gandhi, Home Minister Shivraj Patil, Law Minister Hans Raj Bhardwaj, Finance Minister P Chidambaram, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee, HRD minister Arjun Singh and Political Secretary to the Congress President Ahmed Patel. Then came the two meetings on November 7. The first saw first Sonia Gandhi discussing the matter with Ambika Soni, Ahmed Patel and Chidambaram. This was followed by a meeting between the PM and Chidambaram. Chidambaram – along with Bharadwaj and MoS for science and technology Kapil Sibal – were the three providing in-house legal advice on the issue.

While the decision to remove Natwar Singh as external affairs minister may have taken the sting out of the tail, this is clearly not the last we have heard on the issue. The BJP will continue to campaign for him to be dropped altogether and when the winter session commences on November 23, the Congress will have to brace itself for a fresh onslaught from the opposition.