Politics & Power Quote by Manmohan Singh

"The Chinese have certain advantages. The fact that it's a single party government. But I do believe in the long run the fact that India is a functioning democracy committed to the rule of law. Our system is slow to move but I'm confident that once decisions are taken they are going to be far more durable"

Manmohan Singh, Statesman

About this Quote

Singh is doing something rare in geopolitics: conceding the appeal of authoritarian efficiency without genuflecting to it. By calling China "advantaged" because it is a single-party state, he acknowledges the blunt reality every Indian policymaker feels in their bones: Beijing can decide, mobilize, and build at speed while Delhi argues, litigates, coalition-bargains, and sometimes stalls. The line lands because it refuses the usual moralizing. It admits envy as a data point.

Then comes the pivot, and it's not just patriotic reassurance. Singh frames democracy as a technology of durability. "Functioning democracy committed to the rule of law" is less a slogan than a claim about institutional memory: policies born out of negotiation, parliamentary legitimacy, and judicial scrutiny are harder to reverse, harder to delegitimize, and more likely to survive a change of government. He is selling friction as resilience. The "slow to move" clause anticipates the criticism and neutralizes it, recasting delay as proof of constraint rather than incompetence.

Context matters: Singh spoke as the architect of India's liberalization and a leader constantly compared to China on growth, infrastructure, and state capacity. At a moment when the "China model" was fashionable, he offers a counter-narrative tailored to investors, allies, and domestic skeptics: India's messiness is not a bug; it's a risk-management system. The subtext is strategic patience. India may lose the sprint, but it wants to win the marathon without breaking the legitimacy that holds the country together.

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Topic	Decision-Making
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Manmohan Singh (born September 26, 1932) is a Statesman from India.

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