Mizos waiting for Dream Chief Minister

Aizawl, Jun 29: At a time when the general Mizo populace has begun to lose faith in politicians owing to the latters' failure to fulfill their electoral promises, the Anil Kapoor-starrer 'Nayak' has taken the poll-bound Mizoram by storm.

Nayak, a remake of director Shankar's South Indian original, is about a private TV channel's ace reporter Shivajirao Gaekwad (Anil Kapoor) who becomes the Chief Minister of Maharashtra for one day when the current CM Balraj Chauhan (Amrish Puri) challenges him to take it up. Assisted by Bansal, Gaekwad exposes around 46,000 corrupt officials in the state and orders their suspension. He tours the city himself and orders the arrest of 12 ministers, including the Chief Minister himself, making himself their enemy. Later, on seeing the people's plight Shivajirao agrees to stand in the elections and wins by full majority.

As Mizoram is going to the polls next November, the people are on the lookout for candidates like Shivajirao to elect as their Chief Minister and MLAs.

Thanks to the media boom over the past five years, Mizos have become politically more aware compared to a term ago. Among the farmers, there has been political awakening that the politicians had cheated on them which is proved by the fast growing farmers' movement under the banner of Zoram Kuthnathawktu Pawl (farmers' association).

''In such a socio-political situation, this Hindi film leaves a huge impact on the people of Mizoram,'' Maliana, a political science lecturer, said.

A Hindi movie creating a storm in a Christian-dominated and westernised Northeastern state, which is cut off from the rest of the country, such as Mizoram, in itself is highly remarkable.

Since the early 80s, any Hindi movie, including the Bollywood blockbusters, has never made it big in Aizawl. But Nayak, ever since its Mizo version made its first appearance on a local channel, has viewers glued to their TV, and become the most demanded film.

The fact that the entire dialogue in Nayak is dubbed in the local Mizo language has contributed to its huge impact, since Hindi is hardly understandable by the majority of Mizos.

''Sometimes, we showed the film throughout 24 hours of the day.

Encores for the film are still pouring in,'' a cable TV operator said.

Nayak is more popularly known to Mizos as 'Ni khat CM (One-day CM)' rather than its original title.

''I don't love Hindi movies. But this 'One-day CM' is something different for its message. I hope our politicians have watched it.

Anil Kapoor in reel life is the person Mizoram badly needs in real life. Mizoram needs a Shivajirao for our next CM,'' Lalramliani, a housewife, said.

The all-powerful Presbyterian Church, with a total congregation of nearly half the approximately 10 lakh population, has not raised a murmur this time unlike its request to cable operators to stop screening 'Kasauti Zindagi Kay', a Balaji Telefilms soap last year since it interfered with the evening worship by its flock.

Several frontal organisations of the Church like the Mizoram People's Forum has been aggressively advocating the utopian Shivajirao-style government for Mizoram after having failed to achieve results from the previous Congress and the present Mizo National Front governments.

These frontal organisations even put up their own candidates in previous elections to the Legislative Assembly with all of them without exception losing even their deposits.

This time round, a spate of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as Prism, Mizoram Democratic Movement(MDM), Mipui Tangrual Pawl (MTP), have sprouted in the past one year with the single-minded aim of ensuring that a non-political party's government and Opposition is set up to liberate the tribal state from corruption and other major evils.

However, the forthcoming polls, to be held sometime in November, will tell whether the Mizo dream of Shivajirao will become a reality or the state will be saddled with old but as yet unmellowed wine in a new bottle.

UNI