Syed Safdar Gardazi/Islamabad

The Gah town was not a familiar name even to many people living in the Chakwal district of Punjab province of Pakistan where it is located. In May 2004, it shot into prominentas a man born on its soil becomesthe Prime Minister of India.

Dr. Manmohan Singh, who passed away on Thursday, was born in 1932 to Gurmukh Singh and his wife here. As his mother passed away early in his life and his father stayed in Peshawar for business, Manmohan Singh was raised under the care ofhis grandparents Sant Singh and Jamna Devi in Gah.

When former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf met Manmohan Singh in Delhi, he presented a painting of his native region as a souvenir to him. According to his daughter, this watercolourwork hung in Manmohan Singh's bedroom.

At that time, the media published pictures of the school register containing the names of students ofprimary schoolin Gah, where Manmohan Singh studied.His name was also listed. In the details recorded by primary school teacher Daulat Ram on 17 April 1937, his roll number was 187, his caste was listed as Kohli, and his father's occupation as a shopkeeper.

Manmohan Singh became Prime Minister of India for the second time after Congress' victory in 2008. His daughter Daman Singh, along with her sister Kiki, compiled his memoirs Strictly Personal: Manmohan and Gursharan published in 2013.

Daman Singh's Book on her parents

After passing the fourth grade, he moved with his uncle Gopal Singh inChakwal citywhere he joined Khalsa High School. Young Manmohan Singh's favouritepastime was to wander the streets and markets of Chakwal and observe its buildings.

Daman Singh downloaded pictures of Chakwal's markets, houses, gurudwaras, and government buildings from the search engine Googleand showed them to his father. Despite so much time having passed, Manmohan Singh correctly identified the ancient buildings and streets of the city.

The fact that the Indian Prime Minister was born in Pakistan also had an impact ondiplomatic relations between the two countries. Raja Muhammad Ali, his childhood friend from his native village, visited him at his official residence. Other people from Chakwal who knew his family and played with him in their childhood also started visiting him from time to time to see and feel proud of his friend becomePrime Minister of India.

Describing the scene of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh receiving an envelope filled with soil from Gah. Singh writes that 'an emotional smile could be seen on his face and the sparkle of memories in his eyes.'

His other daughter, Kiki, saw him eagerly and happily grabbing a bottle of water from Chakwal. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's family faced trouble when he refused to stop eating the famous Zamana Rebari from Chakwal despite doctors' advice.

Gah Primary School

When he was 11 years old, ManmohanSingh'sfather shifted him to Peshawar where he had a dry fruit shop near the Mahabat Khan Mosque in the inner city. Manmohan Singh passed the 8th class examination from Khalsa High School in Bala Hissar area of ​​Peshawar in 1945.

His father built a house in Guru Nanak Pura, a hamlet justoutside the old city. Thearea was populated by Sikhs and Hindus at that time."I began to show my father the map of the inner city," his daughter writes.

“He enthusiastically told me the names of all the ancient buildings, gardens, mosques, temples and, government buildings and his memories associated with them.”

He identified Lady Reading Hospital and told them that heoften visited his neighbourthere. Daman Singh recalled his father's memories of Peshawar and spoke about Lady Griffith High School in nostalgia.

'It was a girls' school. A girl from our neighbourhoodstudied there. The girl was very beautiful. Her father was a doctor in the nearby village of Pubi. Her mother suffered from tuberculosis.' When his daughter Kaki asked the girl's name, Manmohan Singh replied, 'I have forgotten.'

There were many cinema halls in Peshawar, the childhood home of Manmohan Singh.His passion for watching movies often took him there. When his daughter asked him the name of his favouritemovie, he said 'Ram Rajya'.

At that time, the victory of the Alliesin the Second World War was celebrated all over India. Sweets were distributed to students and teachers at Peshawar's Khalsa High School.

13-year-old Manmohan Singh refused to eat sweets distributed to his fellow students and classmates to celebrate the victory over the British. This was the beginning of the awakening of his political consciousness.

In March 1947, Manmohan Singh passed the matriculation examination conducted by Punjab University. This was the only examination whose result was never declared, due to the riots that took placein Punjab during the partition of India in March.

A farmer in Gah town

Manmohan Singh's house in Gah was burnt down. His grandmother was given shelter by a neighbouringMuslim family. When all the non-Muslim men in the village were killed, the police took his grandmother to a relief camp. In July 1947, his father left with his wife and children and settled in Haldwani.

Gurmekh Singh went to Peshawar inthe following August to locate his shop and house but returned from Pakistan empty-handed.

After the partition of Punjab, in 1947, the Punjab University Act was passed in Indian Punjab,  ManmohanSingh'sresumed his education. In 1948, he again wrotethe matriculation examination. This time he did not even have textbooks.But Manmohan Singh qualified for a scholarship after scoring 694 marks out of 850.

Manmohan Singh tookadmissioninFSc at Khalsa College, Amritsar. His father wanted him to be a doctor but he soon lost interest in scientific subjects. He was expelled from the college after some time. He joined his father in business for a while but then joined Hindu College.

Recalling memories with his daughter, he said that another reason for leaving Khalsa College was his inability to pay the hostel fees. In 1950, he secured firstposition in the Intermediate examination. In college, he was also the president of the Punjabi Society and student editor of the college magazine. Manmohan Singh also contested the college student union elections and lost. This was his first failure in the political field.

Manmohan Singh is called theeconomic reformer of India.As an economic affairs advisor in the 1990s, he implemented the policy of economic liberalization in India. Theconcept of privatization and expansion of infrastructure for the development of the private sector was acquired by himdue to his higher education in economics from the prestigious universities of the United Kingdom.

After completing his post-graduation in Economics from Hoshiarpur College, he obtained a degree in Economics from Cambridge on a scholarship. After working on a research project at the university, he received a scholarship for PhD at the prestigious British University of Oxford.

At the time whenhe was studying in Oxford, famous Pakistani architect Yasmin Lari was also studying in the UK with her husband Sohail Lari.She and Manmohan Singh's family were neighboursin London.

School register with Manmohan Singh's name

Yasmin Lari said that Manmohan Singh would often visit her husband. The two would discuss and debate the politics and culture of the subcontinent. His nature was extremely gentle and refined. Yasmin Lari said that despite his immense talent, Manmohan Singh did not let others realize that hehad extraordinary abilities.

During his visit to Pakistan when Manmohan Singh was the Governor of the Central Bank of India, he alsomet Yasmin Lari and her husband at their home in Karachi.After earning a doctorate in economics, he worked for some time at the United Nations. He then became an advisor to the Planning Commission of India and Governor of the Reserve Bank of India.

He got the opportunity to be a part of the government machinery as the Secretary of Economic Affairs in the government of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. In 1984, when Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards, Sikhs were being attacked in the city of Delhi, and their property was set on fire.

Manmohan Singh wanted to attend Indira Gandhi's funeral, but friends advised him to remain inside the guest house of the central bank. Due to his long experience and fame in economic matters, he was associated with VP Singh and Chandra Shekhar governments as an economic affairs advisor in the 1990s.

Even though he entered politics, he had no constituency. Congress made him a member of the Rajya Sabha. He was also chosenas the leader of the opposition in this house by the Congress.

After the victory of Congresson 24 May 2004, when the name of Manmohan Singh came up as thePrime Minister, there was a stir and surprise in theIndianpolitical circles. His name for the post of Prime Minister was suggested byKuldeep Nayar, a famous Indian journalist and politician born in Sialkot, Pakistan.

Kuldeep Nayyar writes in his memoirsthat in the Congress Parliamentary Party meeting, the members were demandingthat Sonia Gandhi herself be made the Prime Minister. Some members even staged a sit-in in the meeting and some refused to leave the hall.Sonia's son Rahul Gandhi alsowanted to see his mother become the Prime Minister.

Dr. Manmohan Singh with Pakistani leaders

Kuldip Nayar described him as a failed Prime Minister who did not have the courage and bravery to take any step without the consent of Sonia Gandhi. In his second term as Prime Minister, he faced serious resistance and opposition from within the Congress.

Two years ago, a film with the same name was made onManmohan Singh's tenure as Prime Minister, in which famous actors Akshay Khanna and Anupam Kher played the lead roles. Due to the memories associated with the soil of Pakistan, he wanted reconciliation and friendship between the two countries. The extraordinary progress made during Pervez Musharraf's tenure towardsending the conflict between the two countries was a clear expression of this thinking.

In 2009, he met the then Prime Minister of Pakistan, Yusuf Raza Gilani. He also attended the ceremony to markthe restoration of the Sikh holy shrine Kartarpur Sahib and allowingpilgrims to visitit in 2019, due to Pakistan's efforts.

Manmohan Singh gotthe opportunity to visit Pakistan twice in his life. The first time in 1967 waswhen he was associated with the United Nations; hewent to Islamabad to meet Dr. Mehboob ul Haq. At that time he visited Panja Sahib, the holy religious place of the Sikhs near Islamabad.

He came to Pakistan for the second time in 1984 to attend the Asian Central Bank Governors Conference hosted by Pakistan. On both occasionshe did not want to see his home and village in his native region. After becoming Prime Minister, people who visited Chakwal kept urging him to visit his left behindvillage again.

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Daman Singh writes in his book; “My sister saw the water bottle brought from Chakwal in his hand and asked if he wanted to see his birthplace. 'No', he replied softly. 'Not necessary. This is the place where my grandfather was murdered.”

Courtesy: Translated from Urdunews.com of Saudi Arabia