Bengal elections: Will voters dance to the tune of Disco Dancer?

Among his fans in Bengal Mithun Chakraborty, is often referred to as Mahaguru, which in Bengali means “the great master”. He earned the moniker in 2007 while judging a dance reality show on television.

On March 7, that sobriquet sat rightly on his shoulders in the midst of a swelling crowd of lakhs when he joined BJP in Kolkata’s Brigade Parade Ground in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

As Chakraborty delivered a few of his punchlines on screen, the crowd roared in a decibel level that rivalled the levels which greeted Modi himself.

The intended political dividend is not to be missed.

Mithun has earned an identity of ‘Bangalibabu’ (the Bengali bhadralok) and one of his popular films has a dialogue that suits BJP – which is battling Mamata Banerjee’s contention that it is a party alien to the Bengali culture and ethos – to the T. “Ami gorbito ami Bangali (I am proud to be a Bengali),” is the line that he repeated at Brigade Parade ground that will surely be repeated in the campaigns that he would appear in over the next few weeks.

Does Mithun still have star appeal? This seems to be most relevant question as the 70-year-old dived headlong into electoral politics in a spectacular manner in the grandest possible platform in his state.

While speaking to journalists, he refused to reveal who brought him to BJP. Despite that non-disclosure, it is quite evident that BJP leaders would utilise his image as a man who beat the odds in life to emerge as a messiah for the masses.

In the movie Bangali Babu (2002) he plays the character of a man who grows up in a slum in Bengal but beats all odds to become as the messiah of the locals.

In another film Ami Shubhash Bolchi (2011), he plays the character of a struggling middle-class man Debabrata. Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose visits him in dream, suddenly become a man of steel and takes on a real estate promoter, who is a non-Bengali.

When asked about his role in BJP, Mithun referred to the film MLA Fatakesto which had a dialogue the he said in Sunday’s rally. “Marbo ekhane, lash porbe soshane (I shall hit you here and the corpse will appear at the cremation ground),” he said and the crowd went into raptures.

Irrespective of how much dent Mithun makes in the TMC votes, something is already quite clear. Though Mamata Banerjee had given tickets to a dozen new faces from the BengaIi film and TV serial industry, Chakraborty would corner a lot of the limelight in the media in the run-up to the election.

The star’s image on the ground also has the attributes that would help the party reap political benefits.

His neighbours recall him as Gauranga Chakraborty, a student of science stream of Kolkata’s Scottish Church College, who left the city for Mumbai during the height of the Naxalite movement. He was a sympathiser of the ultra-Left movement and had a taste for drama, outdoor games and dancing, something that earned him a lifelong identity on the silver screen.

He is also known for helping some of the local youths in times of need, often absorbing them in his own businesses.

Chakraborty was born of humble middle-class parents. His father was an employee of Calcutta Telephones and his mother was a homemaker.

Mithun the actor was discovered by Mrinal Sen, who featured him in his film Mrigaya (1976) and Chakraborty won the first of his three national awards for best actor for it. As an actor he never look back, appearing in more than 350 films and bagging three national awards as best actor.

However, Mithun the politician has not come anywhere close to his on-screen record.

Though his initial sympathy was with the Naxalites, he later moved close to the Left Front that ruled Bengal for 34 years. He was close to sports minister and Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Subhash Chakraborty and campaigned for Left candidates.

After Trinamool Congress came to power, he was nominated by Mamata Banerjee to the Rajya Sabha in 2014, a position from where he resigned in 2016.

In 2015, he struggled to get the Saradha taint off from his image by returning Rs 1.12 crore – an amount that he got post tax deduction from the Saradha group for which he was a brand ambassador – to the Enforcement Directorate.

Will Mithun contest himself?

“I shall do whatever the party instructs me to do. I believe in protocol,” the actor enigmatically said on Sunday.

However, there is hardly mystery as to how BJP wants to utilise Mithun’s star appeal.