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NEW DELHI: Days after the Supreme Court gave former prime minister Manmohan Singh a clean chit in the coal block allocation case, senior Congress leader Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday invoked former PM’s legacy and attacked the Narendra Modi government.Sonia said Singh’s record of integrity and accountability was in stark contrast to the way the Modi government has functioned. She said history would remember Singh as a quiet, gentle but “highly consequential prime minister.”Taking a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Sonia said that since he is currently “forgiving” students who attacked him, he could also use the opportunity to forgive himself for his “undignified slander” against Singh.The Congress parliamentary party chairperson said the Supreme Court judgment ended what she described as one of the most tragic episodes in public discourse — the “witch-hunt against Dr Singh, a man of the most remarkable probity and integrity.”“The lobby against him was coordinated and well-organised, with actors stretching from the bureaucracy to the media, the judiciary, civil society, and most certainly to the RSS and BJP. Today, their bogus crusade has come to its inevitable conclusion of nothingness. Dr Singh has been vindicated on every count,” Sonia said in an article published in The Indian Express.Sonia said July 29, 2026, was an important but largely unacknowledged date in India’s recent political history. On that day, the Supreme Court upheld the CBI’s clean chit to Singh in the alleged coal block allocation scam.She also pointed out that the Supreme Court criticised the trial court for rejecting the CBI’s closure reports and making adverse remarks against Singh without any “compelling reason”.Sonia said Singh’s record of integrity and accountability stood in contrast to what she called as the Modi government’s “misuse of agencies” such as the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the CBI.“Its purpose has been to exert pressure on politicians. Leaders are either silenced through coercion or cynically folded into the BJP or, in some remarkable instances, rewarded with ministerial positions as well.“When credible accusations of corruption emerge, the Modi government simply brushes them aside. Corrupt when you’re in the Opposition, suddenly clean when you jump ship!” Sonia said.Sonia also said it was not a coincidence that Modi was among the most vocal critics of Singh.“His snide and atrocious remarks in the Rajya Sabha on February 8, 2017, that only Dr Singh knew ‘the art of bathing with a raincoat on’, will go down as the lowest point of our parliamentary history,” former Congress president said.“Introspection, like charity, must begin from home. Ultimately, the attack on Dr Singh was motivated by a desperate desire to shift the public conversation and narrative away from his outstanding governance record,” she added.Sonia highlighted Singh’s economic record, saying his government brought major economic changes, high growth rates and a rise in consumption and private investment.She said India also showed resilience during the 2008 global financial crisis.“Let us not forget that in spite of the reworking of how the growth of India’s GDP is calculated, the 10 years of the UPA government saw higher economic growth than the past 12 years, resulting in millions being pulled out of poverty,” Sonia said.She also highlighted several welfare and social justice initiatives introduced during Singh’s tenure.According to Sonia, the Manmohan Singh government delivered the constitutional promise of the Right to Education and expanded OBC reservation in centrally funded higher education institutions, including the IITs and IIMs.“The Forest Rights Act recognised the ancestral rights of our Adivasi and forest-dwelling communities, after a decades-long struggle. The MGNREGA, recently demolished by the Modi government, was the most powerful social security intervention set up anywhere,” she said.Sonia also cited the National Food Security Act, 2013, as another major achievement of Singh’s government. The law guaranteed access to basic food rations for crores of families.She said civil society became stronger during Singh’s tenure and people could protest against the government and prime minister.Sonia also claimed that Singh regularly remained accountable to Parliament and the media through more than 100 unscripted press conferences.“And of course, we cannot forget that the landmark and path-breaking Indo-US nuclear deal, which overturned decades of nuclear discrimination against and denial towards India and marked our arrival on the global stage, was possible because of his political courage and sustained initiative,” she said.Sonia said the allegations against Singh’s integrity had now been exposed as baseless and that his record was increasingly being recognised as a period of economic, political and social progress.“We all certainly regret that he is not here to see this day and to guide the nation with his wisdom. But it is a solace to us all that his prophetic prediction of January 2014 is becoming increasingly self-evident with every passing day.
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“History will indeed remember him kindly as a quiet, gentle but a most consequential prime minister,” Sonia said.Her remarks came after the Supreme Court closed the criminal case against Singh by setting aside a summoning order against him.Singh, who died on December 27, 2024, now stands formally acquitted in the high-profile criminal case.
