Just as the countdown began for ISRO’s Mars Orbiter Mission, Rahul Gandhi with his penchant for last minute interventions barged into the Mission Control Centre at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre and announced “Sriharikota, we have a problem.” The animated Rahul Gandhi declared, “This mission is nonsense, we should just dismantle this spacecraft and hurl it into space.” Finally he demanded that the Mars orbiter be diverted to Jupiter while hastily adding that this was his personal opinion. ISRO scientists were resigned to the fact there is no escaping Rahul Baba.

When curious media personnel questioned Mr Gandhi on his choice of planet, he candidly replied, “Jupiter is in my shirt, Jupiter is in my pant.” When asked to elaborate on this absurd explanation, Rahul Gandhi went on to describe how his emotionally overwrought mother wept when he told her about Jupiter’s weighty issues, including the matter of its escape velocity. The media was suitably impressed with his candour.

In all sincere earnestness Rahul Gandhi explained that experiments on Jupiter with might help improve the lives of dalits. “With the economy in shambles, there is an awkward silence as I eat daal chawal. The experiments in Jupiter would make for suitable dinner time conversation with the poor, grounded people.” Rahul Gandhi who fancies himself an expert on escape velocity, also declared that it was his duty to inform his constituents on the latest breakthroughs in physics. When probed on the timing of the intervention, the Gandhi scion said, “I accelerate my decision making only during the last minute; it’s all about the escape velocity”

Gandhi also used this opportunity to make another of his poetic analogies, “India is like Jupiter, which has many multi-coloured belts including the Muslim belt, Adivasi belt and the Dalit belt. We want to capture all the vote belts.” Unlike the beehives and bouquets analogies, the third analogy also seeks to create a more astronomy-informed electorate.

Digvijay Singh also jumped in to explain, “Mars is a red planet, which is just about as close as a planet can get to being saffron.” He then went on to publicly deride Mars for being a communal planet. He contrasted the hardline rocky stance of mars to the fluffy philosophy of the jovian gas giant. Jupiter has undoubtedly established its secular credentials.

Ajay Maken then proceeded to re-direct the mission to Jupiter. The congress spokesperson gave full credit of the mission to Rahulji and his deep understanding of the nature of escape velocity. The mission was also rechristened to pay homage to one of the many Gandhis. Another congress spokesperson, also went on to explain why the Gandhis disappear from the face the earth during many of the crisis during UPA’s tenure. “They take off to Jupiter, to visit other homes in our Solar System. Symbolism, especially of the daal–chawal variety, is not restricted to earthlings, it is a universal message.”