Chandigarh, November 4
It’s Divali season… the payback time. The “just-out-of-recession” corporates, riding high on the recent growth in the industrial output, are taking the luxury route to spoil their political and bureaucratic “friends” this Divali.

Gone are the days of presenting gold coins and jewellery. This season, top of the line single malts from Blue Label King George V or Martell, crystal ware from Rosenthal or Swarovski, mobile handsets from Vertu or Apple, or Swiss watches are being offered as gifts. In case, an idol of Lord Ganesha has to be presented, it is either handmade porcelain article (Lladro), or made of the out-of-bounds silver. Pashmina shawls, especially the current rage of hand woven “Kanhi”, are being “gifted” to the fairer sex holding positions of power.

Of course, the gifts being presented to babus depend on their current assignment in the government, and in case of politicians, these depend on the clout they enjoy in the corridors of power. The single malts being offered to the bureaucrats are generally in the range of Rs 4,000 - Rs 10,000 (and Rs 34,500 in case of Blue Label King George V).

While the Vertu mobile handsets cost several lakhs, an iPhone from Apple is valued at Rs 32,000. Luxury watches - Emporio Armani, Frederique Constant, Movado or Rado cost anything between Rs 20,000 and Rs 1 lakh, while the Lladro idols can cost anything between Rs 10,000 and Rs 50,000.

Other than this, Mont Blanc accessories (pens, wallets, cufflinks), and the Swiss and Belgian chocolates, Turkish sweets like Baklava, are being offered as add-ons to the above-mentioned gifts. In fact, the rows of luxury cars parked outside government officers’ residences in Sectors 2, 5, 7, 11, 16, 24, 35, 39 and 42 in Chandigarh leave hardly anything for guessing about the ‘Divali visitors’ to these houses here.

With the days of recession being over, corporate houses, real estate developers, telecom operators, those in cash and carry business, liquor trade and, of course, big industrial houses in the region, are happy to be obliging those in power.

“Globe-trotting bureaucrats and politicians in this region know the cost of these gifts. Jewellery is a matter of personal choice and most of these people have surely accumulated huge stacks of gold coins over the years. So, these luxury gifts have been a hot favourite this season,” said a top executive in a real estate firm, having huge business interests in Punjab and Haryana.

If Divali is a perfect time for business houses to pay “obeisance” to the sahibs in each department, it is also a litmus test for the latter to assess their “clout”. “We have to be very careful when we give Divali gifts to officials of the same level. God forbid, if they were to discuss and find that the “Divali value” of one has been assessed lower than the other, our business would be doomed. So all precaution has to be taken, and gifts are planned accordingly,” said another liaison officer with a leading telecom operator.