Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh retired from Rajya Sabha today (April 3, 2024). 91-year-old Manmohan Singh was the Prime Minister of the country twice. He was the Prime Minister of the country from 2004 to 2014. It was his last innings as an MP. For the first time in October 1991, former Prime Minister and Congress MP Dr. Manmohan Singh, who is considered to be the initiator of economic reforms, became a member of the Rajya Sabha. He was also the Finance Minister in the Narasimha Rao government from 1991 to 1996. Today the tenure of two senior cabinet ministers of the present government in the Rajya Sabha also ended with Manmohan Singh.
Meanwhile, the special thing is that while on one hand Manmohan Singh is retiring from the Rajya Sabha, on the other hand Congress Parliamentary Party chief Sonia Gandhi is reaching the Rajya Sabha for the first time. For the first time, Sonia Gandhi will enter the Upper House from Rajasthan.
It is significant that Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge wrote an emotional letter to Manmohan Singh on Tuesday, a day before his retirement. Kharge said in his letter that Manmohan Singh served the country and worked with great devotion and dedication for the poor. He further wrote that Manmohan Singh has been such a person whose advice has been very important to him.
My letter to Former Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh ji as he retires from Rajya Sabha, today.
As you retire today from the Rajya Sabha after having served for more than three decades, an era comes to an end. Very few people can say they have served our nation with more… pic.twitter.com/jSgfwp4cPQ
— Mallikarjun Kharge (@kharge) April 2, 2024
Manmohan Singh was an MP in the Rajya Sabha for almost 33 years. He introduced new financial and administrative reforms in the Indian economy. The tenure of Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnav and MP and Union Environment Minister Bhupendra Yadav in the Rajya Sabha has also ended.
Two Union Ministers also retired from the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday, while five other Union Ministers retired from the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. Among them are Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, Information Technology Minister Rajiv Chandrasekhar, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries Minister Purshottam Rupala, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Minister Narayan Rane, Minister of State for External Affairs V. Muralitharan and Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting L. Murugan included.
If retired MPs from Rajya Sabha are talking about contesting the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, then all other Union Ministers except Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnav and Murugan are contesting the Lok Sabha elections.
Samajwadi Party’s Jaya Bachchan is also among the MPs to retire from the Rajya Sabha. But, the Samajwadi Party has once again sent Jaya Bachchan to the Rajya Sabha.
Senior Congress leader and famous advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi’s tenure in the Rajya Sabha has also ended and at present he has not been re-admitted to the Rajya Sabha. Abhishek Manu Singhvi contested the Rajya Sabha elections from Himachal, but lost due to cross voting.
Former Union Minister Prakash Javadekar, National Media In-charge Anil Baluni, former Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar Sushil Kumar Modi are among those who retired from Rajya Sabha. While Anil Baluni is contesting the upcoming Lok Sabha elections from Uttarakhand’s Garhwal seat, former Union Minister Prakash Javadekar and former Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi have not been nominated for the second term in the Rajya Sabha.