Dr. Manmohan Singh speaks..

"In 1991, while presenting the Budget for 1991-92, as Finance Minister, I had stated : No power on earth can stop an idea whose time has come. I had then suggested to this august House that the emergence of India as a major global power was an idea whose time had come. Carrying forward the process started by Shri Rajiv Gandhi of preparing India for the 21st century, I outlined a far reaching programme of economic reform whose fruits are now visible to every objective person. Both the Left and the BJP had then opposed the reform. Both had said we had mortgaged the economy to America and that we would bring back the East India Company." - Ref

"Whether I am a weak or a strong Prime Minister, actions of our government speak volumes about it." Ref

"Throughout my life, I have believed that substance triumphs over style, performance over public relations, and hard work over short-cuts. I am not a sloganeer. I will readily concede that most of my opponents make more rousing speeches. They may have more catchy phrases and may run better marketing campaigns. But unlike the NDA’s Prime Ministerial candidate, I will not be found weeping in a corner while hoodlums tear down a centuries-old mosque. Nor will I be found wringing my hands in frustration while one of my Chief Ministers condones a pogrom targeted at minorities. And I will certainly not say things in Pakistan that offend every Indian and then abandon my stand when it becomes politically inconvenient within my party. Mr. Advani has the unique ability to combine strength in speech with weakness in action. This is not the kind of strength we need. " Ref

"I have often said that I am a politician by accident. I have held many diverse responsibilities. I have been a teacher, I have been an official of the Government of India, I have been a member of this greatest of Parliaments, but I have never forgotten my life as a young boy in a distant village.

Every day that I have been Prime Minister of India I have tried to remember that the first ten years of my life were spent in a village with no drinking water supply, no electricity, no hospital, no roads and nothing that we today associate with modern living. I had to walk miles to school, I had to study in the dim light of a kerosene oil lamp. This nation gave me the opportunity to ensure that such would not be the life of our children in the foreseeable future.

Sir, my conscience is clear that on every day that I have occupied this high office, I have tried to fulfill the dream of that young boy from that distant village."- Ref

---watch this space for more--

Also see: Do we thank him?

Anybody got this book? To the Nation, for the Nation