In what would have been dismissed as being at worst a mildly humorous situation has rapidly escalated into what a senior Congressman described as “a hundred times worse than the Bhopal incident”. The incident occurred during a post rally meeting during which Rahul Gandhi (fondly known as Rahul-baba by his admirers) was scheduled to mingle with students of an up-market city college.

Matters went south when what sources present describe as a sour, foul smell permeated the room. The smell, allegedly of a fart, overpowered many-a-resolve in the crowded room, causing a young girl to faint and a journalist to throw up. Matters got out of hand when a student afterwards suggested that it was Rahul Gandhi himself who was the perpetrator as “he seemed to actually enjoy the smell”.

This unplanned development completely threw the State and Central Congress machinery out of gear with six different members (including one ex-minister who was not present at the time of the incident) accepting responsibility for the smell. Abhishek Manu Singhvi alleged in a late-night call to NDTV that it was actually the BJP who was responsible for the smell and threatened a defamation case against the student who has wrongly accused Rahul-baba. Jayanthi Natrajan categorically denied Rahul-baba’s involvement stating that he seldom farts and when he does “it smells of jasmines”. “He has excellent bowel movements”, Jayanthi stressed before calling a close to hastily called press meet. Digvijay Singh put the blame squarely on Arjun Singh though it is felt that this was an error caused due to his frantic attempts to regain the trust of his party’s leadership.

The seemingly conflicting and at times bizarre statements from various leaders to protect Rahul have attracted media attention the world over resulting in the chief whip issuing a gag order on this issue. “All queries will be addressed directly to the PMO and speaking out of turn on this issue will be dealt with severely”, he added. Dr. Manmohan Singh has reportedly lost sleep worrying about this issue.