PM Manmohan Singh shrinks as the O in PMO takes over

A new power equation at the top appears to have been implicitly worked out to run UPA-2 for the rest of its term. The earlier structure — where Sonia Gandhi ran the party and its politico-economic agenda while Manmohan Singh handled the humdrum day-to-day affairs of the government — has simply not worked.

From the outside, it seems clear that the recent changes in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) after the arrival of Principal Secretary Pulok Chatterji are meant to achieve three objectives deemed important by Sonia: One, keep the government functioning; two, preserve the image of Manmohan Singh as the outward façade of UPA-2 till Rahul is ready to take over; and, three, ensure that Sonia’s electoral agenda is pushed through by pulling ministers and bureaucracy together.

In the new dispensation, power has partly transited from the PM to the PMO – and that’s where Pulok Chatterji comes in. Pulok is proxy for Sonia Gandhi since she apparently trusts him fully. When she went to New York’s Sloan Kettering for her operation, it was Pulok who kept the whole manoeuvre secret. He is now the designated hero of the PMO show.

So the question “After Manmohan who?” has now been answered. It is not Pranab Mukherjee (PM), it is not P Chidambaram (PC), both of whom have been damaged by recent disclosures relating to the 2G scam and the allegations emanating from a past Sebi board member.

Sonia will rule with Pulok Chatterji doing her work at the PMO; he will run the show using her backing as the glue to get babus and netas together; and all of it will be done in the name of Manmohan Singh. Or so it seems.

A look at recent newspaper headlines tells the real story. “PM sets up A-team to get cracking on power reforms”, says Business Standard. Pulok is the head of this so-called A-team. The PM’s job, it seems, is over once he sets up the team.

The Economic Times was even bolder. “PM’s secretary Pulok Chatterji steps in to tackle the impending coal-power crisis”, it said. So Pulok will attempt what the PM himself cannot do: bash heads together and get decisions implemented. Enter Pulok the Superman to replace old 1990s reforms of Rambo Manmohan Singh.

The Times of India makes no bones about Pulok’s role either: “Pulok entry makes PMO hub of key economic decisions.” Note: it’s PMO, not PM. So we were wrong to assume that economic decisions were the PM’s forte. They are now going to be orchestrated by Pulok Chatterji.

As the Times sees things, power has shifted from the cabinet secretariat to South Block, from bureaucracy to The Bureaucrat, the PM’s Principal Secretary.  Says the newspaper:  “Now it’s learned that Manmohan Singh is relying on Chatterji to improve the electricity scenario, keep tabs on stake acquisitions by global pharma giants, gas allocation and remove hurdles facing large infrastructure projects” (sic).

This does not make sense. While all PMs rely on bureaucrats to implement their decisions, the emergence of Pulok Chatterji as the new mover and shaker of South Block tells another story: this is more likely to be Sonia’s design than Manmohan’s desire. In the Times story, replace the phrase Manmohan with Sonia, and everything falls into place. Pulok is Manmohan Singh’s Sir Humphrey Appleby of BBC’s Yes, Minister fame, only his real reporting will be to the party president.

Pulok is not the power behind Manmohan’s throne, but the power pushed forward by 10, Janpath, to ensure that the current occupier of the throne does not mess things up further.

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Thursday’s developments underscore the new role of Pulok Chatterji clearly. The government quietly announced the appointment of NDTV journalist Pankaj Pachauri as Communication Adviser in the PMO. Again, it’s the PMO, not PM. The previous incumbent, Harish Khare, was media adviser to the PM, and he has put in his papers. Pachauri will report to Pulok, not the PM.

Says The Indian Express: “The development, which surprised many in bureaucratic and media circles, carries a subtext: the emergence of Chatterjee as the clear power centre in the PMO. Sources said Chatterjee began some weeks ago to consider the idea of a specialised team to address the image deficit that the PM has been suffering for some time.”

The sub-text in this sub-text is obvious. Manmohan Singh is no longer capable of protecting his image. Put another way, what this means is Pulok will use the PM’s leftover image as a cover to rebuild the image of the UPA-2 and Sonia Gandhi.

What explains these changes?

The first reason is that Sonia is no longer confident about Manmohan’s reliability – not on the personal loyalty front, but in his ability to get her job done without embarrassing her.

In UPA-1, it was always clear that the PM would let Sonia take the call on all big issues while he would do the day-to-day plodding. However, this arrangement came unstuck as the outside world saw Manmohan Singh as a reformer with some ability for independent action.  External expectations forced Singh to try and discover his own agency and be his own man. This is what led him to assert himself on the nuclear deal – which almost brought the government down. This is what contributed to the retail FDI fiasco, too.

Now, of course, the media knows Manmohan Singh is largely a cipher.

This realisation must have damaged the old Sonia-Manmohan understanding. As the media and the outside world realised that Manmohan Singh didn’t have the cojones for the job, it became more important for the PM to prove he could move certain things. This was what led to a private meeting with editors last year to improve his image. It didn’t ultimately help, since image has to accord with reality – where the PM is seen to get things done.

As the PM’s image continued to descend to the pits, it led to other problems in UPA-2. Sensing that Manmohan Singh may be replaced, both Pranab Mukherjee and P Chidambaram may have thought they were in with a chance for the top job. This was the phase where the media saw several attempts to damage both Pranab and Chidambaram – which ultimately forced Sonia Gandhi to step in and ask them to patch up (read more about it here , and here , and here ).

UPA-2’s downhill ride happened steadily in 2011 and Manmohan Singh and his ministers failed test after test in political and economic crisis handling. The government flunked the Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev challenges and proved to the world – and, more particularly, to Sonia — that Manmohan’s occasional attempts to do his own thing, coupled with his basic incompetence to pull it off, was actually bringing UPA-2 to disrepute.

Now, the government’s real challenges are economic. This should have been a good enough reason to bring Manmohan back into the picture, but Sonia obviously is not sure she can rely on him to manage things. This is where Pulok Chatterji emerges as the new economic czar of the PMO. Placing him in an economic role both reinforces the image of governance without completely erasing Singh from the picture.

So we now have a three-way power structure with Sonia as the key decision-maker, the PM as figurehead, and Pulok as the driver of change. He is, in fact, the kind of PM Sonia would have liked.