If such excessive reverence for the high and mighty is conspicuous by its absence in the more advanced countries of the West, the reason is their transition from feudalism to democracy, which saw the gradual erosion of the powers and privileges of the kings and nobles.

So, when George Bush's daughter is caught by the police for a minor offence, the President has to go to the police station since the rules stipulate the presence of the father of the girl. Such a course of events is unthinkable in India.

What such a process of erasing the distinctions between individuals in various positions of life does is to compel the rich and the powerful not only to live the life of ordinary people, even if on occasions, but also to make them careful not to transgress the limitations of such a life because of their privileged position.

It is the absence of such an awareness which made S.M Krishna and Shashi Tharoor think nothing of staying in five-star hotels for all of three months before a newspaper report made the government ask them to move to humbler dwellings. Had the report not appeared, the External Affairs Minister and his junior in the ministry would have happily stayed on in Maurya and Taj, spending lakhs of rupees every month.

What is noteworthy is not so much their extravagance for, after all, both of them are rolling in money - their own and that of their relatives - as the fact that they were simply not aware while signing the credit cards that they were doing anything out of the ordinary. Clearly, they live in such a rarified atmosphere, where routinely spending stacks of money is of little consequence, that they couldn't dream that anyone could consider their splurging of wealth either objectionable or obscene or even amusing.

Where else can one stay but in five-star hotels, they must have told themselves when informed that their official residences - which are also fit for maharajahs in Lutyens' Delhi - were not ready. Reports suggest that Tharoor did take a brief look at the Kerala Bhavan rooms only to reject them out of hand, apparently because of their dinginess, and also because it did not have a gym.

As an international civil servant, he has always lived a life of high comfort, and that, too, in the West. So, his sniffy reaction to Kerala Bhavan is understandable, especially because he is apparently yet to get used to the more austere norms and conventions of Indian politics, even if some them are hypocritical.

However, he has done his own reputation no little harm by the stark demonstration of the distance between his lifestyle and those of even other politicians who did not aspire to be the UN Secretary-General.

But if Tharoor's missteps are understandable, Krishna's indifference to the possibility of ridicule is not. He, after all, has always been a professional politician in India and must have some idea of the conditions of the common people.

That he is not particularly bright has become evident only now because he is clearly all at sea in the external affairs ministry. As Yashwant Sinha said, he is yet another Shivraj Patil in the Congress stable, the contemptuous reference being to the dandy former home minister who was also clueless about security problems.

But, whatever Krishna's failings as a minister, he should have been aware that living for months in five-star luxury - even if the expenses are borne by his son-in-law who owns the Café Coffee Day chain - will not mark him out as a sensitive person.

Or, did his stint in the Mumbai Raj Bhavan insulate him so much from the heat and dust of the Indian scene that taking refuge in Maurya was the only way out ?

While the legal system has become fairer than before, as the jailing of politicians accused of criminal offences and of socially influential people, as in the BMW hit-and-run case, shows, the barriers between the VIPS and the ordinary people have been reinforced by the security threat. Hence, the highly irritating cordoning off of roads while the convoys of high-level politicians pass by or the intimidating behaviour of the commandos who surround them.

Although the choices of Krishna and Tharoor for expensive hotels were not guided by security concerns, they were not unrelated to the existing chasm between the privileged and the ordinary. As long as exceptions are made for the politicians, such as not stopping at red lights, the kind of egregious conduct of which Krishna and Tharoor were guilty will continue to be seen. (IPA Service)