As from a stone dropped in a pond a very long time ago, the deeds of Irish revolutionaries and missionaries ripple faintly still through the world of the poor and oppressed.

In the land of the Celtic Tiger, de Valera has become a figure of ridicule, while priests and brothers are often the subject of scorn and abuse. But in many parts of the developing world these men continue to be a source of inspiration.

Dr Manohar Singh Gill, chief election commissioner of India, is one of those men keenly aware of the way his country modelled its struggle for independence on the trail blazed by Irish leaders of the early 20th century. And, through his education at a Patrician Brothers school in the foothills of the Himalayas, he owes a more personal debt to Ireland. "Duncan, Masterson, Fleming, Bergin, Duffy . . . All these brothers, now buried so far from their home, gave me a marvellous education. What I am, I owe to them," he says.

Gill, a man of many interests and no little courage, was the guest of the Government in Dublin recently, having met Tanaiste Mary Harney while she was on a trade mission to India last year. His visit was a reminder that although the West might control the world economically, it does not have the monopoly on wisdom.

As the chief election commissioner in the world's biggest democracy, Gill is no mere functionary, serving the whims of the politicians. India inherited a vibrant, resolutely independent election system from the British and has, unlike so many other ex-colonies, managed to hang on to it. Gill and his commission call the shots throughout the process; they determine the timing of an election, and only the president has the power to impeach Gill. Once an election is called, government ministers are prohibited from using state aeroplanes or cars and there are rules against the offering of gifts, inducements or spending sprees aimed at winning votes.

The statistics of Indian elections are almost impossible to comprehend. India has 620 million voters, five million polling staff and 800,000 polling stations. Gill has overseen the casting of about three billion votes since he became commissioner in 1993. "It must be worth an entry in the Guinness Book of Records," he says, with undisguised pride.

One-third of the population is illiterate, so it's important to keep the process simple. Each political party has its own symbol - a hand, say, or a lotus flower - to make the ballot paper more manageable. Yet 10 per cent of votes cast in the last election in 1999 were registered electronically, and the aim is to computerise the entire election next time around.

Compare this to the electoral system in the US, where voting methods vary from state to state and even from county to county, where the process is manual and where the same people campaign for politicians and then certify the results. So which country is the more democratic?

Not that Indian democracy is without its faults.

"To that, I say it's easy to talk of a perfect democracy when your per capita income is $20,000 a year. Try doing it, as we do in India, on an average income of $400 a head," says Gill.

He was on his first trip to Ireland, but he has seen enough of the West to see that it is turning in on itself.

"What you get here in Ireland is very limited reporting of my country and others which are poor," he says. "We know a lot more about you. You're not thinking citizens of the world if you're self-centred. Wealth should not take away your concern for the world and your thirst for knowledge."

"Remember the village," intones this product of peasant stock in the Punjab who went on to study English literature and economics before carving out a career at the highest levels of the Indian civil service. A keen amateur photographer and the author of books on travel and folk tales, Gill is also an accomplished climber and served as head of the Indian mountaineering federation for six years.

Education by the Patrician Brothers has imbued him with a sense of religious tolerance lacking among some of his compatriots. As a result, he is a passionate defender of the secular character of Indian society and of its Christian minority. Following the murder of a Catholic priest, Father Das, in India in September 1999, Gill took the brave step of describing himself publicly as a Christian, a Catholic and a Sikh.

Yet his schooling at Mussoorie in northern India was no less severe than an Irish education elsewhere. Gill can still recite huge chunks of Shakespeare he learned by heart, and two complete Gospels (not bad for a Sikh). There's also the memory of a few running gags about his Irish surname, and the virtues of that great Sikh playwright, John Millington Singh.

On his week's stay in Dublin, he met Ministers Liz O'Donnell and Noel Dempsey. But the highlight of his visit was a reunion at Newbridge College in Co Kildare with his former school principal in India, Brother O'Byrne. "The brothers gave me the roots, and for that I kiss their feet," he says.