How reel life inspired Nikhil's real life

From wheelchair to athletic tracks, Nikhil's journey to realize his paralympic dream shows how cinema can ignite courage, make one believe in second chances, narrates Anuraag Singh

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ACK in 1972, Indian Army soldier Murlikant Petkar, who suffered paraplegia (paralysis of both legs and the lower part of the body) in the 1965 India-Pakistan War, overcame the disability with sheer will to win the country's first Paralympic gold with a world record timing in 50m freestyle swimming.

More than half a century later, the same Kartik Aaryan-starrer 2024 Bollywood flick, 'Chandu Champion', a biopic based on Petkar's life, is inspiring a 25-year-old paraplegic youth, Nikhil Rajput, in Madhya Pradesh to chase his Paralympic dream. Paralysed below the chest due to a mishap in March 2023, Nikhil, a resident of Bankhedi village in central MP's Narmadapuram district, has won three gold medals and two silvers in a span of just six months at two successive State Para Athletics Championships at Gwalior and Bhopal.