UN Secty. Gen. Guterres calls Manmohan Singh’s role ‘pivotal’ in India’s economic trajectory

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United Nations – In an official condolence message, Secretary General Antonio Guterres expressed his grief and said that he was saddened to learn of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s passing.

“The Secretary-General extends his deep condolences to Mr. Singh’s family and to the Government and people of India,” said Stéphanie Tremblay, Associate Spokesperson for the Secretary-General, on December 27, 2024 at the UN.

“Mr. Singh played a pivotal role in India’s recent history, particularly in shaping its economic trajectory,” said Guterres.

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“As Prime Minister from 2004 to 2014, Mr. Singh oversaw a period of significant economic growth and development in India,” said Guterres in his message.

Referring to India’s closer relationship with the UN under Singh, Guterres said in his message, “Under his leadership, India also strengthened its collaboration with the United Nations, contributing actively to global initiatives and partnerships.”

During his years as the Prime Minister, Singh addressed the UN many times. Although he was well known for his humility, his addresses were marked with gentle but firm statements about the UN’s role and about the collective responsibilities of the developed countries, especially economic and environmental responsibilities.

As early as 2009, at the UN Climate Change Conference in Denmark, Singh had been candid with his remarks. “India was a latecomer to industrialization and as such we have contributed very little to the accumulation of greenhouse gas emissions that caused global warming, but we are determined to be part of the solution.”

In his statement at the Plenary of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, Rio+20, in June 2012, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Singh had hit the mark again with a direct statement about the cost the developing counties would incur for bringing about the required changes.

“Difficult though it may seem, we have to summon the imagination to balance the costs that we will incur in the present with the benefits that will accrue to future generations,” Singh had said in his statement then.

Singh had criticized the lack of funding and technology support from the industrialized countries. He had pointed out that the current consumption patterns in the industrialized world were unsustainable.

Speaking to the 66^th session of the UN General Assembly in September 2011, Singh, known as the finance genius, had spoken about the negative impact on the developing countries of the recession in global economy in the U.S., Europe and Japan and the resulting inflation causing newer regulations in support of their workforce.

“We should not allow the global economic slowdown to become a trigger for building walls around ourselves through protectionism or erecting barriers to movement of people, services and capital,” he had said.

In his last address to the UN General Assembly in 2013, Singh had once again come to the point straight, saying eradication of poverty requires special attention. “The problems of over a billion people living in abject poverty around the world need to be attacked more directly,” he had stated.

“We will succeed if we adopt a cooperative rather than a confrontationist approach. We will succeed if we embrace once again the principles on which the United Nations was founded – internationalism and multilateralism,” Singh had said.

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