Cut out

When Rahul Gandhi took a swipe at the "false promises" by the Opposition, i e the Bharatiya Janata Party, praising its exemplary "marketing skills" with his widely reported comment, "They are like those who are good at selling combs to the bald," he had his audience in splits at the All India Congress Committee session last week. But not everyone understood the joke. Gandhi continued with an attack that may have been directed at the newbie Aam Aadmi Party, saying, "Some new people have come now who have already started giving a haircut to bald people." Even as the stadium broke into laughter, it was clear that the Hindi idiom was lost on Finance Minister P Chidambaram. He was seen asking Sonia Gandhi's Political Secretary Ahmed Patel, whose explanation included gestures indicating the combing of hair, after which the finance minister, who hails from Tamil Nadu, joined the general laughter.