Till Sonia Gandhi clearly informed the country that Dr Manmohan Singh will be our prime ministerial candidate, there was speculation in the media and the opposition parties, that the party would not let him continue or that someone else would take over. But that absolutely clear announcement generated a tremendous amount of confidence: he took on Mr Advani and in spite of his ill health, he campaigned wherever he was asked to. His contribution was not only to the campaign; what he did in the last five years is more important. I think the ‘India story’ was our contribution. This manifested itself in the nuclear deal, which changed our relationship with other countries. I think the urban voters particularly voted for the continuation of that story—and to that Dr Manmohan Singh contributed greatly. Moreover, when it became apparent that there were many prime ministerial candidates, that a Mayawati or a Jayalalithaa or somebody else could actually become the prime minister if the Congress did not win, that also contributed to the verdict. Dr Manmohan Singh also contributed directly in running a smooth government, handling a difficult coalition. Nobody thought the government would last, but it did.

•Amitabh Sinha: Crucial ministries have gone to people who are considered to be performance-orientated. What is the changed mandate you have got from the Prime Minister this time?

The Prime Minister has said, get going. People expect a great deal from this Government, much more than what we achieved in the last five years. But there are constraints: there’s the economic slowdown and the growth rate may not be as high as in the last five years. The ability to spend would be constrained. The main objective would be to continue high growth rates so that we have the ability to spend. So the prime minister has told his ministers not to waste even a single day. He has asked us to chalk out a 100-day programme. This programme should catch the imagination of the people. We have competent people manning key departments, even some of our allies have performed well. As for the Cabinet, Sonia Gandhi and the Prime Minister have spent a lot of time working out the matrix of regional and political balance, the political equations in the states and the relationship with our allies.

•Amitabh Sinha: How do you plan to manage all the portfolios assigned to you?

Business as usual is not difficult. What requires time is a qualitative change in the way things work. I would like to concentrate on administrative reforms, criminal justice reform and judicial reforms. I also oversee the CBI; there are over 8,000 cases and something as simple as a case of bribery takes as long as 30 years to be disposed of. Private sector people are being harassed because someone paid a small bribe to a government official. Some analysis needs to be done on how much time is being wasted on small cases while the big fish get out.

•Neha Sinha: Is India going to push for nuclear energy for clean development?

Nuclear energy is a clean energy, we have mastered the technology. We have sorted out the fuel problem also by importing it, thanks to the nuclear deal. We want to set up nuclear reactors, which we want to import. We have already signed up with the Russians and the French and we are looking at the US also. We are looking to set up nuclear parks. One already exists in Tamil Nadu, the next one is coming up in Maharashtra and the third site will be identified soon. Some people want us to amend our Atomic Energy Act to include private sector participation. There is no political consensus on whether the private sector should be allowed into the field of nuclear energy generation. It will be a political decision.

•DK Singh: Now that you have no constraint from allies, are we going to see a thrust to reforms in the banking or insurance sector?

We want to go ahead with banking, insurance and pension reforms because we need long-term funds. We need funds whether through partial disinvestment of profitable public undertakings or any other way. In case we can take our allies from Tamil Nadu and West Bengal on board, then we would like to push for partial disinvestment and reforms in these sectors.

•Vinay Sitapati: After 26/11, when former chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh was asked to resign, you were spoken of as a possible replacement, so what went wrong? Also, Deshmukh was asked to resign for his failure in preventing the Mumbai terror attack. What sense does it make to get him back as a Central minister?

I was doing work here. To drop that and take up a new responsibility months before the elections was never seriously considered. As for the second question, I can’t answer it. It is PM’s prerogative.

Unni Rajen Shanker: In UP and Bihar, you decided to go it alone and it was a successful experiment. Are you going to do that in Maharashtra too?

I would like to clarify that both in UP and Bihar, there was no ideological clash. What happened was that we tried to explain to our friends that the Congress’s footprint in UP and Bihar has increased, the support base is greater and we want the number of seats accordingly. Both the Samajwadi Party and the Rashtriya Janta Dal have admitted that they made a mistake in underestimating the Congress’s strength. So it is not as if we wanted to dump our allies. We could have done that in Maharashtra and Jammu and Kashmir too. In UP and Bihar, the work done by Rahul Gandhi and his team was significant but the allies did not give us credit for that and therefore did not give us the seats we asked for.

Coming to Maharashtra, the Congress has performed relatively better than the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). Congress cadres are keen that we fight alone. The political situation in Maharashtra is unique: a division of votes between us is only important in areas where the Shiv Sena or the BJP pose a serious threat. But in areas like Western Maharashtra, where the Shiv Sena has virtually no existence and there are just the Congress and the NCP in the fray, let the people decide which Congress is better. If we do not get an absolute majority then we can join hands again—we are secular parties. I would not like to jump to the conclusion that we should fight it out alone there. It will have to be a carefully considered decision which the high command will take.

•Vaibhav Vats: In Mumbai, the Congress largely won because of the split in the vote between the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and the Shiv Sena. Was the Congress the beneficiary of a vote split rather than of good governance in Maharashtra?

Together we got 25 seats out of 48, which is nothing great. There was a time when the Congress used to get 47 out of 48. But for the split in votes between the NCP and the Congress, we would have won all the seats. The MNS did get some votes and did divide Sena-BJP votes and maybe we got the benefit in some Mumbai constituencies because of it. But that did not happen across Maharashtra.

•Shishir Gupta: The PM talked about merit in connection with Cabinet selection. But we have several former CMs who failed in their own states, like SM Krishna, Veerappa Moily, Vilasrao Deshmukh and Virbhadra Singh. Are you honouring ex-chief ministership?

The theme was that CMs have a huge experience in every sector of the state from working at the ground level, which people sitting in Delhi do not have. Our difficulty is that many of the social sector programmes are designed in Delhi, we try to optimise the programme thinking it will work well in the country. But the ‘one size fits all’ solution does not work. Each state has different realities. The ex-CMs will help design policies mandated from Delhi, particularly in health and rural development. For example, the NREGS was Maharashtra’s idea. It was refined by Delhi with bank account and minimum wages.

•Ravish Tiwari: Why did UP get no Cabinet berths? Did other political parties have a say?

UP should have got Cabinet ministers but this is not the end of the road, there could be changes. Rahul Gandhi had a very clear vision: all Congress ministers of state are from the Lok Sabha and all are second-timers except for one or two. This time there are fewer ministers from the Rajya Sabha. First-time MPs have not been included. People say that Maharashtra is getting too high a representation, which is not true because the state is the second-largest. However, UP definitely should have got more berths. The insinuation that any other party influenced the Congress to stop somebody getting a berth is incorrect.

•Amitabh Sinha: Is the door shut on people like Lalu Yadav joining the Cabinet?

Such decisions are the prerogative of the PM and Mrs Sonia Gandhi. But the mood in the party is that with a large number of Congress MPs having been elected, people who are not pre-poll allies should not be taken in. Also, there is a revival possibility in Bihar and UP and nobody wants to reduce the chances of a Congress revival in either.

•DK Singh: How do you explain the trust between Sonia Gandhi and the PM?

Dr Manmohan Singh has some outstanding qualities that I saw at close range. I laughed when Mr Advani called him a weak Prime Minister. The relationship between Congress President Sonia Gandhi and the Prime Minister is a very special type of relationship. The party, led by Sonia Gandhi, got a mandate in 2004 and she decided to make Mr Manmohan Singh PM. It is within the broad framework of the party’s manifesto that the government has to function. The UPA was led by Sonia Gandhi, so the accusation that the PM consulted her was totally misplaced—they had to work in tandem. The PM’s qualities—courteousness, punctuality, decisiveness—are what make the relationship even more special. The PM has been able to take difficult decisions in high-pressure situations. Sonia Gandhi, too, never breached protocol and was equally polite and courteous. So the chemistry worked although many thought it would not.

•Shishir Gupta: You are in charge of the CBI. Do you have a plan to make it more transparent rather than let it remain a handmaiden of the government?

I am not in charge of the CBI and neither is the PM. We are only administrating the department. The CBI is supervised by the Central Vigilance Commissioner, by a recent amendment of the law. The PM or the Minister of the Department of Personnel cannot direct the CBI to drop charges or take up a case. Therefore, the charge that the government meddles in CBI matters is not entirely correct. They do give progress reports when asked because it is our duty to find out how many cases are pending. But the Government does not direct the CBI to conduct a particular investigation in a particular way.

•Shishir Gupta: The CBI told the Supreme Court that in the Mulayam Singh’s assets case, it had to show the report to the Department of Personnel under which it falls.

I don’t think that is correct. The Department of Personnel is the ministry in charge of administration of the CBI. Appointments are made by a committee chaired by the CVC—the government only suggests a panel. The CBI does not have to show us any report. Many a time we merely act as a post office between the CBI and the Law Ministry. But a lot needs to be done to make it more transparent.

•Sukalp Sharma: Are you happy that the Trinamool Congress crushed the Left or are you apprehensive that they are the new Left?

I hope the Trinamool does not become the new Left. I think Mamata Banerjee has her own agenda to finish in West Bengal. We will work together with her. She has decided to spend more time in West Bengal and we are happy to work with her, she is a Congress person.

•Shishir Gupta: Is there any serious thinking going into administrative reforms to make bureaucrats more accountable?

Administrative reforms and other reforms are at the top of the agenda of governance. We have the second Administrative Reforms Commission report of Mr Moily—only a few things in the report have been acted upon. The mandate of my Ministry is to implement the report. There is a mechanism to implement it through a core group under the chairmanship of the cabinet secretary and then the group of ministers (GOM) that oversees it. That mechanism will continue. We are trying to change the civil service examination. The UPSC has proposed some amendments which we are planning to implement soon. There will be many changes in the way government of India works and over the years you will see reforms implemented.

Transcribed by Sobhana K