The beauty of our MP’s expenses was that it was all nicely handled in the confines of the Palace of Westminster and (apparently with some exceptions) fully receipted, thus remaining hidden for many years.

The chances of the substantial amount of wonga recently given to Mayawati Kumari, chief minister of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, remaining hidden are fairly minimal as a photo of a humungous garland of 1,000 rupee (about £14) notes being handed to her appeared around the world.

Makes our MPs’ efforts to get some tax free cash in expenses pale into insignificance doesn’t it?

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Indian tax authorities are now investigating whether this has been declared as a political donation or a personal gift.

While they are at it, the economies of scale may kick in on any such investigation as The Times of India reports that Mayawati had been ‘presented a similar garland of value estimated between Rs 21 lakh and Rs 15 crore on Monday’.

The Taxation exchange rate guide for 2008/09 shows that, at that time, a Rs 1,000 note equated to about £13, although it seems that sterling has suffered even against the rupee so today it’s worth about £14 — bad news if you were thinking of ‘goaing’ to Goa or dallying in Delhi this year.

What else is interesting about this story?

Unlike the UK’s obsession with the million and the billion as defining monetary break points, India uses the lakh (100,000) and the crore (10,000,000). Hence, Who Wants to be a Millionaire becomes Kaun Banega Crorepati? — or Who Will Own Ten Million?, if your hindi is a bit rusty.

So where £150,000,000 might be abbreviated to £150 m in the UK, 150,000,000 Indian rupees would be shortened to RS 15 cr in India — equating to an upper estimate of £220,000 for one of earlier garlands.

Like the UK, the pun is still appreciated in India, though perhaps not so much by Mayawati who is famously from the poor ‘Dalit’ caste, even though Time magazine reports that she ‘she owns 72 properties and has 54 bank accounts' and is worth about $13 million, 'a fact she puts down to generous supporters who have showered her with gifts of jewelry, art and cash'.

Senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh said that the UP chief is ‘no more a Dalit ki beti but Daulat ki beti': ‘She is not the daughter of a Dalit, but the daughter of wealth’.

Very punny, or should that be very money?

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