During a rally in Gujarat, PM Narendra Modi said Indira Gandhi had covered her nose when she visited the town of Morbi. Did she? Short answer: Yes.
Indira Gandhi covered her nose when she visited Morbi, PM Narendra Modi said at a rally in Gujarat (Reuters)At a rally in his poll-bound home state of Gujarat today, Prime Minister 
Narendra Modi launched a blistering attack on the Nehru-Gandhi family, sparing nobody, from the first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru to his daughter, also a PM, Indira.
During one of several rallies Gujarat, PM Modi in a seeming attempt to further his 'son-of-soil' persona, referred to a time decades ago when Indira Gandhi visited Morbi, a town in western Gujarat.
Referring a photo published by Chitralekha, a Gujarati magazine, PM Modi said he remembers how Indira Gandhi had covered her face with her handkerchief while she was in the town.
"When Indira Ben came to Morbi, I remember there was a photo of her in the Chitralekha magazine with a hanky over her nose due to the foul smells, but for Jansangh/Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) the streets of Morbi are fragrant; it's the fragrance of humanity," PM Modi, who himself was in Morbi today, was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.
Did Indira Gandhi really cover her nose when she visited the Gujarati city? Short answer: Yes.
Long answer: The then Prime Minsiter was in Morbi in the aftermath of a major disaster. On 11 August, 1979, the Machchhu dam, located near Morbi, burst leading to devastating floods that killed thousands (estimates of how many perished in the flooding vary widely).
It was in the aftermath of this deadly dam burst that Indira Gandhi visited Morbi and other sites, sites that had "bloated animal carcasses and dismembered remains of human bodies" being flung on trucks and that were "engulfed by the stench of putrefying flesh," according to an India Today report from September 1979.
Now, the Chitralekha magazine cover that PM Modi was talking about today was published on August 27, 1979, just days after the deadly dam disaster.
On the cover of the magazine is then Indira Gandhi, who visited Morbi on August 16, is seen covering her face with a handkerchief. And then another photo follows: Of a dead body being carted away.
Dead bodies, as the India Today report from 1979 notes, were aplenty in Morbi and its surrounding areas in those days. "Bloated animal carcasses and dismembered remains of human bodies were being flung on to trucks like logs to be stacked in burning pyres beyond the Harijan bustees," the report goes on to say.
"Eight days after the tumultuous flood, on August 11, the city was still, engulfed by the stench of putrefying flesh" the report also said, with the last part perhaps explaining the reason for what Indira Gandhi was seen doing in the Chitralekha cover photo.