Well-Deserved Bharat Ratna for PV Narasimha Rao

Published February 09, 2024

PV Narasimha Rao: A Remarkable Legacy
PV Narasimha Rao, hailing from a humble background in Telangana, displayed extraordinary intellect and versatility, excelling in politics, literature, and sports.

A Visionary Leader

PV Narasimha Rao’s leadership transformed India, steering it from economic stagnation to becoming a high-performing nation, earning accolades from global leaders like Lee Kuan Yew.

Read more about PV Narasimha Rao’s remarkable journey here.

Well deserved Bharat Ratna to PV

The Prime Minister, Narendra Modi has once again made the people to look down upon the Congress by poking its eyes with the tip of the party’s pen, PV Narasimha Rao by conferring on him the well deserved Bharat Ratna.

PV Narasimha Rao popularly known as PV hails from a small village called Vangara in erstwhile Karimnagar district of Telangana.

He was from a landlord’s family when farms were not yielding high returns and their family led a middle class life. He had very little means. For higher education he had to travel to the places, then considered  far off, like  Hanamkonda, Hyderabad and  Nagpur. He was a diligent student brilliant  in a strange mix of subjects like mathematics, science and languages. 

Subsequently he came to be known as a polyglot with a scholarly command in 8 languages. He was an politician,statesman, essayist, poet, novelist and musicologist apart from being a sports enthusiast so much that he would play shuttle even in his 60s and 70s.

He started his political career in Manthani a citedal of Brahmin votes. Subsequently, he won from Hanamkonda as an MP.

As an MLA he was championing the cause of land reforms. Though being a landlord , he showed his commitment to his chosen cause by donating hundreds of acres of his own lands to the landless poor. 

With the sheer dint of his intellectuality, he rose to the position of the Chief Minister of combined State of Andhra Pradesh. But the wily anti-land reforms landlord politicians of Rayalaseema and Andhra could not digest his progress and by spreading canards about his attitude towards the high command and with money bags unseated him. 

He was known for integrity so much that when he was the Home Minister of the  country, his own brothers did not have their own houses in Hanamkonda; now corporators live in palaces. When false cases were foisted on him, to fight them in the courts, he even attempted selling his only house in Hyderabad. Today, Chandrababu is spending millions to defend the accusations against him without a pinch. 

But Indira Gandhi saw merit in him and continuously provided political platform for him at the Center which was followed by her son Rajiv Gandhi. As a result he had embellished and strengthened many central ministries like Education, Foreign Affairs,Defence and Home and was regularly entrusted with the task of drafting manifestos. He was considered brain and soul of the party. No wonder when in the worst crisis of political vaccum and financial emergency, he was the only leader found capable enough to lead the country. And what a way he led it! From the hide bound long stagnating economic morass, he lifted the country to a high performing nation engendering a paradigm shift providing bulwark that now Indians can dream of becoming a developed nation in not so distant future. 

Not for nothing, Lee Yuan Kew, the former  Singapore President who made a poor country into a fully advanced nation in his life time wondered loudly that the Indians were foolish in not giving PV repeated chances. 

He showed his political acumen by sustaining a minority government for a full term and showed the  courage to remove Arjun Singh, the mighty north Indian Takoor from the CWC when he sensed that latter was scheming against him.

He adroitly survived three most dangerous political turmoils in the country namely Harshad Mehta stock exchange scam, demolition of Babri Masjid and the Bombay riots which threatened to cleave the country vertically. 

He initiated look east policy to wean away perennially precarious dependence on the West and did not hesitate to improve relations with Israel for the fear of losing  our fuel supplying Arab countries. Thus he left his enduring mark on foreign policy.

This is the moment of pride and celebration for all the Telugu people. 

Dr Manduva  H Prasad Rao