Leadership lessons from Manohar Parrikar, on his second death anniversary

Note to readers: Today marks two years of the demise of Manohar Parrikar. Parrikar was no ordinary politician, rising to the upper echelon of power despite hailing from a state that sends two MPs to parliament. What made him an exceptional leader? This is part 1 of a two-part series of articles encapsulating those qualities of Parrikar who served as India’s defence minister and chief minister of Goa. Read part 2 here. 

Not so long ago, the word politician used to conjure up images of individuals who are corrupt, uneducated or privileged.  While this stereotyping no longer holds much water, even back then Manohar Parrikar was a politician cut out of an unusual cloth. Parrikar was born into a middle-class family that lived out of a small departmental store – which his younger brother still runs.

He is India’s first IIT educated Chief Minister and was squeaky clean to the extent that even his fiercest critics don’t consider him corrupt. Despite these anomalies, and hailing from a state that sends just two elected MPs to the Indian parliament, Parrikar rose to become and continues to remain one of India’s most respected and inspiring politicians ever.

In the four years that I worked for him as his policy advisor, I had the privilege of observing him from very close quarters. Despite our healthy issue-based differences, which he encouraged and valued, my views on his virtues that were initially formed based on what I had heard of him from media only got strengthened till the last day of his life.

One cannot reach the heights that Parrikar reached, without displaying great leadership qualities. On the second anniversary of his untimely death, I reminisce qualities that he stood rooted in and that made him an extraordinary leader.

Learning mindset: Parrikar was incredibly intelligent, but his intelligence stemmed from his learning mindset and the discipline that backed it. His rigorous and behind the scenes preparation often gave him an unusual cerebral fire power. Right at the start of his stint as Defence Minister, Parrikar was tasked with giving life to the idea of an integrated armed forces command helmed by a Chief of Defence Staff.

In order to come up to speed on the subject, Parrikar immersed himself in reading about 1000 pages on the Goldwater-Nichols Act, the law that institutionalized the integrated command structure in the United States. His knowledge on the subject and other issues concerning it surprised many experts. It even took the Oxford and Yale University educated Ashton Carter, the then US Defence Secretary, with whom Parrikar developed a close working relationship, by complete surprise.

Thanks to his learning mindset, he developed substantial mastery over every subject that was important for him to function. With Parrikar, no preparation was enough and officials whom Parrikar dealt with often had a lot of catching up to do.

Seeking dissenting views: While Parrikar held strong opinions, he consciously sought dissenting views to either validate or revisit his position. In one of the Defence Acquisition Council meetings, where high stake and high value decisions concerning India’s national security are made, the policy regarding backlisting of tainted defence firms was on the agenda.

Parrikar had been mulling over the issue for quite some time and sought opinion from many people including the military leadership, most of whom concurred with him. But he was concerned that there was group think happening on an important aspect of the policy.

Two days before the meeting, he noticed that a junior officer had written a contrary view in the file concerning the policy. Just before a decision was about to be made in the meeting, Parrikar summoned the junior officer into the room and provided the officer a free hand to challenge his opinion in front of the battery of senior most military and civilian ministry officials. After the presentation by the junior officer, Parrikar was convinced that the officer was right and everyone else in the room, including himself, was wrong. He then took an informed decision that continues to serve India’s interest.

Cutting through complexity: Defence Ministry is probably the most complex ministry, and a typical politician would quickly get overwhelmed – but Parrikar was no typical politician. He diligently prioritized issues of vital importance, chose his battles wisely, saw through the vested interests, and applied first principles to cut through the complexity ensnaring the ministry – these allowed him to lead where many would have felt lost.

While doing a detailed review of India’s purchases under the Foreign Military Sales programme of the Pentagon, Parrikar discovered that the Defence Ministry had completely forgotten about a USD 3 billion deposit made into an escrow account many years ago. He then studied the intricate clauses that lead to this situation and identified the account in which the money was lying.

This money was recovered and adjusted against weapons acquisition from the US. The ability to untangle complexity to achieve the end objective made Parrikar a great problem solver.

Putting people before self and system: In July 2016, a retired naval officer put out a tweet seeking help in airlifting his ailing daughter to the Army RR hospital in Delhi. When this matter was brought to his notice, Parrikar instructed the officials in the Ministry to look into it.

After an hour, the file on this issue did its rounds and was presented to him with the view that the Ministry’s resources could not be made available for a private citizen. Upon reading this, he summoned the officials concerned and categorically stated that putting people before the self and the system is what makes governance effective, efficient and empathetic.

Parrikar then overruled their decision on file and ensured that within hours the naval officer’s daughter was airlifted for her treatment in Delhi. Parrikar also officially made it proper for serving soldiers to write to him directly, flagging their concerns – till then it was considered a breach of protocol. He personally read every mail that soldiers and veterans wrote to him and had them answered. While Parrikar was a stickler for process, wherever required, he judiciously used the special privileges available to him to serve people in need. He also encouraged and backed other government officials who did the same. However, he categorically denied people in his circle the benefit of any such privilege whatsoever.