A Humble Request to Our PM !

An Open Letter to Dr. Manmohan Singh from the Youth...

Dear PM,

It was about 2 years back that your party came to power. When it was announced that you will be the next Prime Minister of India, I felt happy. I had not voted for your party in those elections but inspite of that I admired you and thought that you will make us proud. I, like many others, liked the fact that you were highly educated (undergrad from Cambridge, doctorate from Oxford), supremely efficient (he pulled us out of an economic crisis in 1991 and turned the economy around) and unfailingly honest.

However, the developments over the last few weeks have left me deeply disappointed. I've been watching the protests against reservation of seats in higher education on TV for the last few days. I see the usual suspects giving interviews - Arjun Singh, doctors, pro-reservationists etc. They all voice their opinion about an issue which is threatening to snowball into a minor civil war. Students are being beaten and arrested. Patients are suffering. More doctors are threatening to go on strike.

And yet there is absolute silence from the you.

Thinking that I'd missed something important you said in the last few days I searched for the latest news results on Google News with the key-word "Manmohan Singh". Here is list of things I found you did/said over the last few days:

May 14th: "We plan to go in for precision-guided munitions as well as unmanned vehicle technologies in the 11th and 12th Plan period" (source: Economic Times)

May 13th: "our path to progress and development must be mindful of the need to maintain a balance between human needs and nature, between man and environment, between the desires of present generations and the needs of future ones." - while addressing a function to mark Gautama Buddha's 2550th Mahaparinirvana Day (source:Press Information Bureau)

May 12th: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Friday called his Israeli counterpart Ehud Olmert over phone and congratulated him on his swearing-in as the head of the new coalition government last week (source:DailyIndia)

May 11th: Describing as "positive" their meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the leaders of Pakistan's opposition PPP have said the Indian leader expressed concern over the rising militancy in Jammu and Kashmir but asserted that New Delhi was committed to peace. (source: Zee News)

May 11th: Referring to the victory of United Progressive Alliance coalition in the Assembly elections, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today also called this a victory of secular forces in the country. "Elections this time bring the victory for secular forces and this is victory for the UPA" (source:New Kerela)

Mr. Prime Minister, I realize that you are a busy man. I see that in the last few days you have been really preoccupied with tasks such as congratulating the Israeli PM, meeting politicians from Pakistan and even unveiling Usha Uthup's musical tribute to tsunami victims while twenty-something year old unarmed students were being beaten mercilessly in Mumbai. In fact, today, while doctors all over the country were striking and patients running helter-skelter for medical treatment, you were busy thumping the bench while Sonia Gandhi was being sworn in (source:Indian Express)

But please do not disappoint us for much longer Dr. Singh. The country needs to hear from you. What is your stand on this issue? Why is it that we are hearing so many voices but yours?

Please Dr. Singh, an entire generation thinks very highly of you. The entire nation is waiting for you to speak Dr. Singh. Don't let us down !