Former Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, who was renowned to keep mum and speak only when the Congress high command allowed him to, spoke for quite some time (by his standards) in the Parliament today. And this rare incidence made Twitter take note and come up with some running commentary.
Dr. Singh was speaking on demonetisation, and he termed it an organised loot and legalised plunder. Well, terms like “loot” and “plunder” did make people recall his UPA government:
Powerful speech by Manmohan Singh. Standing ovation to him for reminding us organized plunder and legalized loot like 2G, Coal, CWG scams
— Bhak Sala (@bhak_sala) November 24, 2016
Manmohan Singh talking about “organised loot and legalized plunder”. Domain expertise, I say.
— pracchannAstrin (@WordOfTheFree) November 24, 2016
Though there was some confusion about what exactly was this “loot”:
People are looting money and depositing it in their bank accounts? Makes sense https://t.co/p3xPzSm2Ef
— Gappistan Radio (@GappistanRadio) November 24, 2016
He further said that the implementation of demonetisation was monumental management failure. While some criticism of implementation is entirely valid, it did leave people wondering what would have Manmohan Singh done:
Manmohan Singh: “Demonetisation’s been a monumental management failure”
“Any suggestions?”
“Should’ve done what I did”
“What?”
“Nothing”
— Akshar (@AksharPathak) November 24, 2016
Dr. Singh, an Economist and former RBI governor too, predicted that GDP could go down by 2% due to demonetisation. This led to many journalist go gaga over how erudite and capable our former Prime Minister was. Unfortunately, we saw some other kind of Economics when he was in the office:
Economics + Politics of MMS:
1. Increasing returns on marginal sycophancy
2. Information asymmetry b/w 7 RCR & 10 Janpath
3. Beta (Sonia’s)— Rahul Roushan (@rahulroushan) November 24, 2016
He also repeated Keynes’ quote of “In the long run, we are all dead.”, well is that the secret of UPA governance:
MMS: Why bother? “In the long run we are all dead”. I guess that’s why he did nothing while Congress-led UPA looted India. #DeMonetisation
— কাঞ্চন গুপ্ত (@KanchanGupta) November 24, 2016
Some journalists were so moved and impressed that the leftist blog Scroll declared that now historians will treat Manmohan Singh kindly – a wish he had expressed while in the last days of his office. And obviously that wish will be fulfilled:
Manmohan Singh said “History will be kinder to me” after 3087 scams. You can say that when you know your party owns all the historians.
— R (@reviewero) November 24, 2016
However, some “trolls” were still not impressed with Manmohan Singh’s economics:
Yes @AmanKayamHai_ET same economist who brought GDP of 8.4 in 2004 to 4.8 in 2014 !!!!! pic.twitter.com/lIbZ4PPGVk
— Dhaval Patel (@dhaval241086) November 24, 2016
All in all, while some journalists were all starry-eyed and wished for return of Congress, almost everyone was surprised at this turnaround in Manmohan Singh’s character. He had found a voice:
Pic 1: Manmohan Singh when PM
Pic 2: Manmohan Singh when Ex-PM pic.twitter.com/Q4N29LUFle— Hasna Zaroori Hai (@HasnaZarooriHai) November 24, 2016
This magical turnaround of Dr. Singh’s personality was listed as successful outcomes of demonetisation:
#Demonetizaton ke side effects: #ManmohanSingh ji aaj 10min tak bole. Jai Ho.:)
— Anupam Kher (@AnupamPkher) November 24, 2016
While wondering about this turnaround, some wished he had brought this change in his character earlier:
If Manmohan Singh had spoken when it would’ve really mattered, he wouldn’t have needed to speak now when it doesn’t really matter
— The Bad Doctor (@DOCTORATLARGE) November 24, 2016
And well, who knows this might have happened. Old habits die hard:
After finishing his RS speech, did Manmohan Singh look at Sonia & ask ‘theek hai’?#GenuineKoschan
— IndiaSpeaks (@IndiaSpeaksPR) November 24, 2016
Or maybe this might have happened. Old habits again:
After Manmohan Singh ji’s speech,Sonia Gandhi G continuously repeating a dialogue frm film 3 Idiots- Bol Vo Rahe Hain..Par Shabd Hamare Hain
— Paresh Rawal fαи (@Babu_Bhaiyaa) November 24, 2016
There were many more tweets, but well, we should stop now, because:
No. of tweets on Manmohan Singh on my TL has surpassed the no. of words spoken by him in last 12 years.
— चार लोग (@WoCharLog) November 24, 2016
Nonetheless, well done Dr. Manmohan Singh!
