Manmohan Singh comes up with a riposte to Narendra Modi's Swachh Bharat mission

Illustration by Pawan Tiwary

Former prime minister Manmohan Singh came up with a riposte to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Swachh Bharat mission. It was in the backwaters of Kumbalangi, near Kochi, the village of former Union minister K.V. Thomas, who brought Singh over.

Singh declared it a "model village" and said efforts to keep it clean were "in tune with the Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan launched by UPA 2". The former PM cited Shakespeare to buttress his point: "A rose is a rose by whatever name you call it." Singh's statement did not even make it to many Malayalam newspapers. Clearly, they felt the one-line sotto voce was much ado about nothing.