Bangalore, Aug 19 - Basmati literally means 'mother of all aroma' and Basmati rice has been synonymous with India. But now the results of a study by a team of scientists from Cornell University in the US and International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines may dent this national pride.

The scientists say their research has reconfirmed the finding by previous workers that genetically, Basmati rice does not fall under Indica subgroup of rice varieties grown in southern Asia. It belongs to the Japonica subgroup, grown mostly in Japan.

More important, they claim to have shown for the first time that fragrance in rice originated within the Japonica group and the trait was then transferred to Indica rice by a natural process called 'introgression'.

Their results which challenge the traditional assumption that the fragrance trait arose in the Indica group have been published in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the US.

Cultivated rice plant (Oryza sativa) consists of two subspecies, Japonica and Indica. Japonica rice is round and sticky when cooked, while Indica rice has long grains that get fluffy on cooking.

Earlier genetic investigations had led scientists to establish that a gene called BADH2 is responsible for fragrance in rice. 'The predominant allele or variant of this gene called badh2.1 is found in virtually all fragrant rice varieties today, including Basmati and Jasmine types, but the origin and evolution of this allele had remained unclear so far,' the researchers said in their report.

Given that an identical badh2.