India Insight

It’s probably easier for actor Amitabh Bachchan to become India’s president than your average politician.

The ruling Congress party coalition looks like it will at best limp its way to general elections in 2014, stung by a rash of corruption scandals that have tarnished Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s second term in office and led to a dismal performance in state assembly elections earlier this year.

Now the political establishment is abuzz about who will be the next president, a largely ceremonial post that comes open in July.

The incumbent by all accounts bears the hallmarks of the government she represents — ineffectual and damaged by accusations of corruption. Pratibha Devisingh Patil, whose tenure ends in July, was controversially allotted defence land to build a cosy retirement nest. With 12 trips overseas since taking over, she’s also racked up foreign travel bills that cost India more than 2 billion rupees ($39 million), the most by any Indian head of state.

Such lavishness has even led some to question the whole presidential institution within a parliamentary democracy. The president is the constitutional head but has limited powers, similar to that of the monarch in the United Kingdom, despite living in a 340-room palace that was once the British viceroy’s residence.

British press magnate Lord Northcliffe once stated: “News is something someone wants suppressed. Everything else is just advertising”.

It’s interesting, then, that in a season of multi-billion dollar scandals that has seen India’s 24/7 news machine at its probing, questioning, investigative best, one — perhaps bigger and more serious than all the rest — has failed to make the hourly bulletins.

Taped conversations involving corporate lobbyist Niira Radia, anonymously leaked from a reported set of around 5,000 recordings made by India’s Enforcement Directorate and Income Tax authorities, appear to reveal the unholy nexus between India’s business leaders and the political policymaking machine.

But due to the embarrassing proximity that the Indian media elite have to the most controversial dialogues amongst her web of business, political and journalism sources, full-blown coverage has not been seen.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is among four Indians who share space with U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao on the Forbes 2009 list of the World’s Most Powerful People.

Those who dominate the list were chosen based on the number of people they influence, their ability to project power beyond their immediate sphere of influence and their control of financial resources.

For Singh, a self-effacing economist who led a resurgent Congress Party to a landslide victory in the general election this year, the accolade is a reflection of how far he has come since his name was proposed as an obvious choice for the post of Prime Minister.