Jaipur:
For years, supporters of Ashok Gehlot have referred to him - mainly at public events - as "the Gandhi of Marwar". But now the Chief Minister of Rajasthan has run into trouble over the title.
A question in an entrance exam at a government college in Ajmer asked students to guess "Who is the Gandhi of Marwar." Mr Gehlot was listed as one of the options.
The BJP has given the government an F declaring the question an act of sycophancy. "Promoting personality cults is a tradition in the Congress", says Arun Chaturvedi who heads the BJP in the state. "So far, they kept worshipping the Indira Gandhi family and its members. But now they are misusing questions in exam papers to politicise students and the education system."
The Congress isn't embarrassed by the self-declared comparison to the Father of the Nation. It also says that the BJP's Vasundhara Raje promoted herself as a goddess when she was Chief Minister of Rajasthan.
"Even if it's a mistake, it's the fault of an individual examiner, not our government", defends Congress leader Raghu Sharma. "And certainly the BJP has no right to blame us when in their last regime even ministers projected their Chief Minister as a Goddess and used to pray before her photographs."
The BJP wants the controversial question to be discounted from the exam and punishment for the lecturer who included it.