Of cats, rats and rabbits

Despite his gruff exterior and his impatience with fools, Minister for External Affairs Pranab Mukherjee has a wry sense of humour. Recalling how his experience as a finance minister helped him as a defence minister, Mukherjee said he deliberately presented an inflated figure to the finance ministry since he was aware that the ministry routinely scaled down the requested amount drastically. He informed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was called in by Finance Minister P. Chidambaram to mediate, “I am an old cat of the finance ministry and will take a fat rat with me for my new ministry.”

Mukherjee in fact pulled a rabbit out of his hat by getting even more than his ministry had bargained for.