Alpesh Thakor should enlighten Taiwan about their potential

Firebrand Dalit leader Alpesh Thakor’s ingenious (if incredulous) allegation that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has become fair — in the epithelial, not electoral, sense — by eating Rs 4 lakh worth of Taiwanese mushrooms daily should send purveyors of a certain range of creams and potions into a tizzy. Truffle hunters should investigate whether their mushrooms — universally considered to be the world’s most expensive and rare fungi — have a mysterious competitor in Taiwan.

It would not be surprising if many intrepid buyers of fairness creams pencil in trips to Taiwan for the next holidays with mandatory mushroom-gathering forays. And even if the Taiwanese are clueless about the miraculous fungi, the more entrepreneurial among them might as well invent one to cash in. All’s fair in the fairness war, after all.

Of course, PM Modi has earlier mentioned his fondness for morel mushrooms, known in India as gucchi, a name also rather prone to mischievous mispronunciation. But morels are not known to grow in Taiwan, much less exclusively. Rather, they are found in Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh — where the PM developed a taste for them — and some other similarly cool regions abroad. So, people could be forgiven for wondering what magic mushroom Thakor may have ingested to come up with this insight about the PM’s complexion.