In a less select section of the capital, an army of small-time brokers, operating discreetly from cramped flats, go about their business in chauffeured cars with tinted glass and cellular phones.
Industrialists spend a lot of money trying to clinch business contracts from the government.
They maintain flats in Delhi or rent hotel suites to entertain politicians and officials. That corrupt arrangement, however, is no longer so cozy. The scandal involves 115 politicians and bureaucrats who allegedly took bribes or campaign money from Delhi businessman Surendra Kumar Jain over a three-year period. The Congress party of Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao has the most to lose. The scandal has industrialists and their armies of fixers confused.