First thing to outline is priority and experience.
If you friend is buying and keeping a car for the first time then he shouldn't go for an out of mkt or slightly complicated car.
If he has a adviser like you readily available then no issues. So in the first case my advice would be, baleno, cultus, corolla. In the second case you can buy and keep any car as long as you get it at the right price.
In terms of priority he should point it out like, good resale, economical ,repair, comfort and drive, boot space, etc, etc
Now if I had a budget of 5 lac i'd have gone for city 97-98, civic 96-98, lancer 98, galant 95-96, accord 93-95 (in the same order of priority). I guess all these are elegant as well as pleasure to drive cars.