Japanese farmers in their rice field observed that certain rice seedlings grow excessively tall and become weak and sterile. One of the Japanese plant pathologists found that, it is due to some disease, which is caused by a fungus. He named this disease as “bakane” or “foolish seedling” disease. Yabuta extracted the active substance i.e., growth-promoting substances and termed them as gibberellin.

(a) Name the fungus, which caused “bakane” or “foolish seedling” disease.
(b) Give three functions of ‘Gibberellin’.