Sonia, Tata in Time’s most influential list

Sonia Gandhi, Dalai Lama and Ratan Tata are among the most influential on Time magazine’s list in 2008.

Sonia Gandhi, chief of India’s key ruling alliance member Congress Party, and Ratan Tata, who heads one of the country’s top business houses, have been named in a list of 100 most influential in the world by Time magazine.

The list also includes international figures like Tibetan leader Dalai Lama, US President George Bush as well as three presidential aspirants Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

The annual Time 100 list, published in the latest issue of Time magazine hitting the news-stands on Friday, has been divided into five categories — leaders and revolutionaries, heroes and pioneers, scientists and thinkers, artists and entertainers, and builders and titans.

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Sonia has been named to the first leaders and revolutionaries category, along side Dalai Lama, Putin, Obama, Hillary, McCain and Bush.

The most influential business people, named under the ‘Builders and Titans’ category, include global food and beverage giant PepsiCo’s India-origin chief Indra Nooyi, besides Ratan Tata of Indian conglomerate Tata group.

Others who have been named to this category include global media conglomerate News Corp’s Rupert Murdoch, Steve Jobs of Apple Computer, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Mexican billionaire telecom tycoon Carlos Slim.

In a write-up on Sonia Gandhi, written for the magazine, former UN official Shashi Tharoor said, “The story of Sonia Gandhi, 61, is remarkable at every level, and the fairy-tale metaphor barely begins to scratch the surface of its extraordinariness.”

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According to the Time list, those having been named in the ‘Heroes and Pioneers’ category include Hollywood actor- couple Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, TV show host Oprah Winfrey, tennis player Andre Agassi, former British prime minister Tony Blair and Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi.

Besides the ‘Leaders and Revolutionaries’ category also includes China’s Hu Jintao, US central bank chief Ben Bernanke, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates, Malaysian leader Anwar Ibrahim, Iraqi leader Muqtada al-Sadr, Pakistan Army chief Ashfaq Kayani, and Baitullah Mehsud–which the magazine said has been alleged to be mastermind of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination.

Those having been named in the ‘Scientists and Thinkers’ category include Michael Bloomberg, New York Mayor and owner of financial news and data provider Bloomberg, NASA’s Michael Griffin and Wendy Kopp of Teach for America organisation.

Besides, actor George Clooney, pop diva Mariah Carey and author Khaled Hosseini have been named among those in the ‘Artists and Entertainers’ category.

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