New Delhi, March 4
Veteran Congress leader and former Union Minister Arjun Singh died today. He was 81. Admitted to AIIMS some days ago with chest pain and neuro problems, Arjun Singh complained of breathing problem around 5.30 pm. He suffered a heart attack and breathed his last around 6.15 pm, sources said. He is survived by wife Saroj Devi, sons Ajay Singh (an MLA in Madhya Pradesh) and Abhimanyu, and daughter Veena.

In a message, Congress president Sonia Gandhi said, “I express deep sorrow on his death.”

President Pratibha Patil said Arjun Singh was a veteran public personality and the important responsibilities given to him during his long career showed the acumen and ability he possessed.

In her message, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee said, “The nation has lost a great leader who worked tirelessly for the underprivileged section of the society.”

Congress veteran Arjun Singh who breathed his last in New Delhi on Friday was, in his heyday, uncannily shrewd and sharp. Many regarded him as an enigma who could spring a surprise without batting an eyelid. His command over both English and Hindi, his ready wit and subtle way of expressing dissent made it sometimes difficult for journalists to decipher what the undercurrent of his statements were.

Belonging to the Churhat jagir of the former princely state of Rewa in Madhya Pradesh, Arjun Singh rose to be Chief Minister of the country’s largest state and held unquestioned sway. He had a photographic memory and knew the Collector of each district by his name, often addressing them as such when he met them in his days as chief minister.

In August last when this writer interviewed him at his residence over the Rajiv-Longowal accord in Punjab of which he was the behind-the-scene architect as Governor of the State in the 1980s, Arjun Singh looked a pale shadow of his former self. He was confined to the chair and needed help to get up and walk with the stick. His mind, however, was sharp as ever. Mr Arjun Singh revealed that he was quite close to completing his autobiography and was looking forward to it. He was genuinely remorseful that the Rajiv-Longowal accord had not been implemented and blamed the likes of Prakash Singh Badal for it. Yet, while he talked in measured words of his momentous days, there was a discernible tinge of sadness over how the Congress party had virtually abandoned him in his ripe years. A staunch loyalist of the Nehru-Gandhi family, Singh held virtually every important position in the party, at the Centre and in his home state of Madhya Pradesh.

As destiny would have it, Arjun Singh breathed his last the day Congress President Sonia Gandhi dropped the veteran politician from the Congress Working Committee and made him just a permanent invitee to the highest policy-making body of the party.

He was very ambitious but lacked the ‘killer instinct.’ Even his detractors acknowledge that he would have become the Prime Minister had he resigned from the Narasimha Rao government immediately after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992. He dithered hoping that the storm building against Rao within the Congress would ultimately consume him and he would get an opportunity to take a shot at the PM’s chair but that proved to be his folly. In fact, he defended the government on the floor of Parliament while putting the entire blame on the then Kalyan Singh government in Uttar Pradesh for the demolition. Rao went on to complete his term while Arjun Singh was virtually forced to quit the Congress in 1994 and float the Congress (Tiwari) along with another Rao baiter N D Tiwari.

When it came to making news, Arjun Singh almost had no match among politicians. Old timers in the media would recall how he would hold a parallel press conference at his then residence at 1, Race Course Road, just a stone’s throw from the PM’s residence, shortly after the press conference at the AICC headquarters, during the early nineties when the tension between him and Rao was increasing by the day.

And he would make sure that he had switched on the tape recorder for all his on-record interactions with the media, lest the party leadership acted against him for any of his utterances on the basis of press reports. Controversies dogged the Congress veteran right through his political career, spanning more than five decades. First elected to the Madhya Pradesh Assembly in 1957 as an Independent candidate, Arjun Singh joined the Congress three years later. He became the Chief Minister of the state in 1980. As the CM, he was credited with getting many dreaded dacoits in the Chambal valley to surrender, including ‘Bandit Queen’ Phoolan Devi.

He moved to the Centre in 1985 as Commerce Minister in the Rajiv Gandhi government before being sent to Punjab as Governor. After his disastrous flirtation with Indira Congress (Tiwari) Arjun Singh returned to the Congress but his detractors within the party ensured that he lost when he contested the Lok Sabha election from Hoshangabad.

He was rehabilitated at the Centre as Minister for Human Resources Development when the Congress assumed power in 2004 and continued until 2009 before being eased out.

He was elected to the Rajya Sabha in 2006 and held that office until his end.