Skip to content Skip to navigation

Least paid Modi

There has always been an inclination among the commoners to know how much the political bosses who govern them earn. And in doing so, much of the real earning that these bosses take home gets lost in unnecessary gossip for want of accurate details. But that may be a thing of the past because Paycheck India, a research initiative at Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, has come up with a list of salaries of influential political leaders around the world. Paycheck India, which is connected to the international WageIndicator Network, informs about jobs, salaries and labour laws. 

Currently, this Paycheck listing is uploaded in its website and is also in circulation in a major news-portal. Many of us many not know that India’s newly elected Prime Minister, Narendra Damodardas Modi counts among the lowest salary earner among other global leaders in this list compiled by Prof. Biju Varkkey of IIM Ahemadabad. Modi may have some of the toughest challenges ahead to attend but when it comes to reward then he may be well below than those who take more and perhaps works less comparatively elsewhere. This is otherwise a bizarre reality that is seen mostly in India where workforces are paid less for more work. According to Paycheck India, the following is the list of political leaders and their monthly and yearly incomes. 

Name

Country

Monthly Income (in Rs.)

Yearly Income (in Rs.)

Narendra Damodardas Modi

Prime Minister, India

1,60,000.00

19,20,000.00

Pranab Mukherjee

President, India

1,50,000.00

18,00,000.00

Barack Obama

President, USA

19,45,472.00

2,33,45,662.00

Vladimir Putin

President, Russia

13,81,013.00

1,65,72,161.00

David Cameron

Prime Minister, UK

11,78,410.00

1,41,40,926.00

Hamid Karzai

President, Afghanistan

31,029.00

3,72,349.00

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Public Speaker & Former Secretary of State, USA

2,46,26,225.00

29,55,14,706.00

Ban Ki-Moon

Secretary General, UN

11,19,277.00

1,34,31,321.00

Xi Jinping

President, China

1,95,631.00

23,47,569.00

Angela Merkel

Chancellor, Germany

19,42,517.00

2,33,10,200.00

Narendra Modi takes home a monthly salary of Rs. 1.60lakh pm and Rs. 19.20lakh pa. Public Speaker and former Secretary of State, USA, Hillary Rodham Clinton is the highest paid whereas Afghan President, Hamid Karzai is the lowest paid leader in the world. In this list, apart from Modi, Indian president Pranab Mukherjee and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping takes single digit salary (in lakhs) whereas the rest of world leaders are earning in double digit (in lakhs). 

Now these are salaries earned by world leaders for the hard work they put in for the betterment of their countries. But what about those political leaders who have plundered wealth beyond known sources and stashed them abroad in some ‘safer’ foreign banks. Check it out. 

What happens if predictions and bomb explodes at the same time? Well there is nothing extra terrestrial about it. Ram Boolchand Jethmalani, an eminent lawyer and senior politician, whose recent article is making a ripple effect across the country, touching even the hills of northeast. The Supreme Court of India lawyer in his column in the prestigious The Sunday Guardian has rightly predicted the victory of Narendra Damodardas Modi and the failure of Arun Jaitely, recently. The lawyer clarified on a lighter side that he still sticks to his profession of law and have no desire to be a soothsayer. 

Jethmalani, who campaigned in this general election for Modi without distinction or discrimination, despite his expulsion from the BJP, chiefly manipulated by the notorious members of what he called the 160 Club, wrote that he had written to Modi much before the elections that Jaitely’s defeat in this election was more or less certain. While hinting that Jaitely is a member of this so called 160 Club, he said, “... his attempts to flood important decision making platforms of Narendra Modi’s government with his associates is not going to do him or the new government much good, except perhaps inviting his own quarantine in the party.” 

Jethmalani further says that the recently constituted SIT (Special Investigation Team) to recover black money stashed abroad in foreign banks is a sustained effort of his for five long years in the Supreme Court, which is known to Modi, to have a SIT, in the independent Sunday newspaper, The Sunday Guardian, edited by renowned journalist MJ Akbar. While claiming that Modi alone was responsible to include the issue of recovering black money in the BJP election manifesto he said that the former Congress led UPA government of Manmohan Singh managed to frustrate the apex court judgment of July 2011 under orders of Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi. Though this was rejected by the Supreme Court but the additional solicitor general moved the court again right on the day of counting on May 16, says Jethmalani, to get the SIT constitution stayed, which P Chidambaram badly wants. Well, many say that the SIT may not be enough to “recover our stolen money” but what it can do certainly is that it can bring out the names in the process. “What emerges crystal clear is the desperation that even as their party was being pulverised at the polls, the infamous looter trio of Sonia, Rahul and Chidambaram were trying their utmost to stall the Supreme Court directions... Incidentally, I have repeatedly stated in public and to the press that Sonia and her family are the chief beneficiaries of the plunder of US $1,500 billion, equivalent to Rs 90 lakh crore,” said Jethmalani in his column. 

While naming senior BJP leader LK Advani, how he avoided Jethmalani when he met him to obtain the necessary signatures, to a letter that will disclose the names of black money holders, which is required from the political opposition as sought by the Germany authorities during his visit there. Jethmalani said that he first met Advani – who did nothing and referred him to another BJP leader on reminding and lastly to Jethmalani’s own son. This proves that the sharks of black money exist across political parties in the country.  

Jethmalani is also delighted by the 2014 election verdict which he compares to a Victory Day in India’s history when the “... nation broke its shackles and attained deliverance from the corrupt, communal and colonial UPA government headed by the Italian branch of the Nehru-Gandhi family, which has bled our country by several thousands of crores during the last decade,” in the column. He said that the UPA could not have been more misguided when they thought that by breeding corruption in each constituent they ensured their continuity, which will confidently fetch them a plunder in the election from the consequent religious divisions and its vote-banks. But Modi fought hatred, denigration and lies thrown at him and emerged victorious as the nation rejoiced.

Author info

Rajiv Roy's picture

Shillong

Add new comment

Random Stories

Nazira freedom fighter passes away

21 Jul 2016 - 3:40pm | SK Hasan
Freedom fighter, president of Nazira District Freedom Fighters Association and veteran Congress leader Subha Gogoi breathed his last at his residence at Mazenga on Thursday. He was 95 and survived by...

No threat to UPA govt: Moily

18 Sep 2012 - 3:11am | editor
Union Power Minister M Veerappa Moily on Monday said that he had seen no threat to UPA government after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee threatened to withdraw support if FDI decision is...

Teachers to protest

18 May 2015 - 7:21pm | Hantigiri Narzary
The Recognised(Venture) Upper and Lower Primary Teachers’ Association,Kokrajhar district nit has decided to launch agitation on and from June 1 next demanding early provincialisation of schools as...

Stage set for HS results

29 May 2014 - 10:09pm | AT News
The stage is set. Assam Higher Secondary Education Council is all set to announce the results of the HS examination on Friday. The results would also be available on the net at 10 in the morning....

Other Contents by Author

Away from the seemingly causes that led to the pandemic called Novel Coronavirus aka CoViD-19 it cannot be denied that it can well be attributed to the bitter spat between USA and China over trade. The CoViD-19 could well be a creation out of vengeance after what we have witnessed in terms of sanctions on imports by both nations. The arrest of Dr. Charles Lieber - the Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University for making "false, fictitious and fraudulent statements" to the US Defense Department about China's Thousand Talents Plan (a Chinese government program to recruit foreign scientists and researchers) and his affiliation with Wuhan University of...
Can anyone advice Rahul Gandhi (RaGa) that what he and the other nincompoops of the Indian National Congress (INC) are doing in the name of electioneering campaign by targeting the defence forces of the country is only going to decimate their prospect – even if there is any, left? What does it take really to win elections in this country? The defence personnel who are keeping their territory safer from external aggression are being targeted by the INC, insanely. Can RaGa and his inept sister, Priyanka – and her equally inept hunk, Robert Vadra, breath freely if the soldiers in the country aren’t keeping it safe. Can anyone, and for that matter of fact the president of one of the country’s...
An employment advertisement that caused more inconvenience to applicants than providing them with jobs has resulted in the advertiser to issue a statement regretting the inconvenience and correct the blunder being committed, after the matter was reported in the local media, while the affected ones are questioning if the media can really wash off its hands and whether it should not be held responsible, at the same time. Abhinandan Vartaman, the Indian Air Force (IAF) combat pilot has earned immeasurable appreciation, for his valour and courage, from the countrymen after the heroics shown by the force and especially him – who shot down an F-16 jet of the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) – that...
Well Mr. Donald Trump, the outlandish and outspoken US President, with his usual signature facial expression said recently that “walls work” with regard to his decision to construct a border wall, along the border of US-Mexico and even declare a national emergency after the US Congress (the lawmaking branch of the national government) declined to his demands for billions of dollars to fund the proposed wall at the southern border. The president has earned a slew of lawsuits over his emergency move and one may well wander whether such a wall is required in India’s northeast which faces a serious threat to its demography. Arguably, the US President’s idea on a border wall may well be correct...
There are opinions among the tribesmen of Meghalaya that the sweeper lane issue in Shillong town has gone colder since May 31 when mayhem broke over this place near Iewduh, one of the largest traditional markets in the region. That such opinions being held by the native citizenries in a society where matriliny has hit such a low that the fairer sexes are facing insecurities in their own hearth and homes, is in itself, morbid. An incident over an alleged eve-teasing went out of proportion when the local tribesmen clashed with the residents of Sweeper’s Lane, inviting global attention to the issue. The stalemate that exists in this lane dates back to time immemorial and history is replete...
We need to use the social media wisely. But this call is getting lost in a world where anything that is talked about online are caricatured by opportunistic and outrage-mongers. This medium, which is creating more upheavals than connections in societies around the world, should be understood that we choose to assimilate these services into our daily lives because they allow us to deepen social connections and enable us to exercise ourselves in a manner that was unthinkable before their coming.  Many would agree to the fact that after “nature” comes only “social media” in terms of gross misuse. We are witnessing the phenomenon of changing patterns in climate and irrational nature...
If we are to assess one thing clearly about the 2018 Assembly Election to the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly at this point in time then it is the focus and charisma that is awaited coming January. Except that, the assurances, claims, slamming of one party by another will continue to rule the roost and this is not something new in the Indian political diaspora. Nonetheless, this is going to be the most sought after elections given the emerging complex political equations. There is much at stake in this election when the sixty seats to the state assembly goes up for grabbing no sooner the Election Commission of India releases the dates. There is much expectation from the BJP which has since...
Award winning Shillong based author, Kalpana Roy’s ‘Sei Somoy Perie’ (Beyond that period) covers a period of Indian independent movement in the then Bengal, which very soon spread over the entire Indian sub-continent. The book received the prestigious Narsingdas Bengali Prize for the best book in Bengali in Arts / Science subject from the University of Delhi in 2014. The central character of the book – published in April, 2012 – is the renowned independent movement activist from this part of the country, Bipin Chandra Pal, who was born in a small village in Sylhet (now in Bangladesh) district of undivided Bengal. The book is primarily a biographical novel on the life of this great freedom...
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has a successful second visit to United States of America (USA). The major thrust of this visit was centered on his ‘Make in India’ and ‘Digital India’ dream as his meeting with numerous business czars and CEOs of top techies in USA is a big diplomatic push in that direction. While a purring Indian National Congress (INC) is seen crediting itself for this Digital India drive saying that it was the vision of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and all subsequent governments took forward that dream. This version of the INC has only earned laughing stock from one and all whosoever has come in terms with this baseless self-glory statement. Modi on the other hand is a...
“The northeastern states of India should cooperate with each other in terms of their tourism potentialities, culture and tradition, food habits and create a depot in Japan to invite inbound tourism. The geographical condition, cuisine and taste, good atmosphere here are similar to that of Japan. This will not only transform the economy of this region but also open it up to the larger Asia – which is one,” said the Chairman, Japan India Tourism Promotion Committee, Tsutomu Sato on his second visit to Shillong. His first visit was two years ago when he represented Japan on an invitation by the Meghalaya Government which called tour operators from all over the world.Acknowledging candidly that...