Sonia mightier than Hillary in Forbes' list

New York, Aug 28: The Forbes' list is out with 54 business executives, 23 politicians and heads of non-profit organizations rounding out the top 100. Sheila Bair ranks No 2 in US Federal Deposit Insurance Corp that insures bank deposits, due to her increased prominence amid a stumbling US economy and President of Congress, Sonia Gandhi ranks No 21 in the list. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is the world's most powerful woman for the third straight year, topping Forbes magazine's 2008 list of the top 100 women based on their career, economic impact and media coverage.

With the Bush administration clock ticking away, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is the only other government official in the top 10, although she dropped three spots from last year to No 7. The rest of the top 10 is made up of the chief executives of PepsiCo, WellPoint, Anglo American, Kraft Foods, Temasek Holdings, Areva and Xerox.

"It is inspiring to look at what some of these women have done and to listen to some of their life stories," Chana Schoenberger, Forbes' associate editor.

Forbes said 45 per cent of the women are based outside the United States. One third of the women are new to the list, including Argentina's first popularly elected president Cristina Fernandez and Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, chief executive of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

A drop out of a lot of women from the list this year was due to job-realted reason, Schoenberger added.

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