Indian Idol reignites Gorkhaland fire in Darjeeling

---

DARJEELING, Mar 19 (Reuters): India's Darjeeling hills have come alive with fresh demands for a separate state within India for the Gorkha people, with protests threatening the area's renowned tea and tourism industries.
Bizarrely, it was a television talent show, India's version of "American Idol," that lit the fire of Gorkhaland last September, two decades after the end of a insurgency among ethnic Nepalis in eastern India that left more than 1,200 people dead.
Frenzied canvassing for a local boy, ethnic Nepali or Gorkha policeman Prashant Tawang, metamorphosised into a political upsurge that has ushered in a new king of the hills.
Politician Bimal Gurung surfed the wave of ethnic pride unleashed by the TV contest and now is hoping it will carry his people towards Gorkhaland, the separate state carved out of West Bengal they have been demanding for many decades.