POMP WITHOUT POWER: The Indian President reigns but does not rule

For sheer size and grandeur, there are few residences anywhere in the world that can match the Rashtrapati Bhavan. Even a head of state's residence. The palace built by Edwin Lutyens stands on the top of Raisina Hill in the heart of Delhi. There are more square feet of built-up area in this one residence than would be needed for more than a score of plush apartment complexes. So vast is the palace and so comfortable is the life here that successive tenants are known to have dropped not-very-subtle hints about wanting to stay on. Though only one, India's first President Rajendra Prasad, ever got to stay there for two consecutive terms.

It is easy to understand why no one wants to move out. The built-up area of the H-shaped building is approximately 4.75 acres and it is surrounded by 400 acres of what is arguably among the best maintained gardens in the country. It has 345 rooms, 37 large private rooms, a golf course, a swimming pool, squash and tennis courts, two cinema theatres, a school, a huge kitchen where food for up to 1,000 guests can be cooked at a time, a laundry and even a barber shop.

To keep such an establishment running calls for an overdose of hands and Rashtrapati Bhavan has it, presumably with some to spare. The President's secretariat is 350-strong and includes the military and the civil wing. There is also the household staff which numbers about 220. There are 15 cooks and 30 butlers, 165 gardeners, 150 sanitary workers, 60 peons who carry mail and papers in and out of the building, silvermen and masalchis to keep the silver and brassware polished, dozens of electricians and mechanics to ensure that the chandeliers glow, the air conditioners keep humming and the fleet of limousines are in shape.

For all the pomp, there is very little power that the President enjoys and the position has in the past been referred to as a "post office". In recent times though with elections to the Lok Sabha throwing up hung verdicts, Presidents have had occasion to be assertive, sometimes to the point of manipulation. Otherwise, the President's duties are merely ceremonial, with minimum paper work. On a typical day, the President clears a few files, but meets between 50 and 100 visitors. They could be ordinary people in which case appointments are sought and given. Or visiting heads of states or heads of governments, in which case the President plays the perfect host, laying out sumptuous banquets for the visitors. The rush of VVIP visitors from abroad is particularly heavy during the winter months and there are times when every week sees a new guest staying at the Dwaraka Suite of the Nalanda or Mysore rooms.

The upkeep of such trappings does not come cheap. The 2001-2 budget for Rashtrapati Bhavan is approximately Rs 9 crore, up from Rs 99 lakh in 1981-82. While the budget for the establishment shot up ninefold in 20 years, the President's own salary has increased only five times in the same period. It was Rs 10,000 a month two decades ago. Today it is Rs 50,000 per month. But nobody's complaining. After all, it is the perks that matter. And these are perks that even Yashwant Sinha's budget cannot touch.

- Ashok K. Damodaran