Kumam Davidson and Mohd Himat Ali Tampakmayum

Hijam Anganghal’s Jahera eponymously titled after its heroine Jahera became one of the most popular novels of the time followed by AIR Manipur’s adaptation of the same into the famous radio leela Jahera and film-maker Chandam Shyamacharan’s subsequent adaptation of the same into the feature film- Zehra (1999). Jahera/Zehra became a household name in mainstream art and literature of its time. The story revolves around a conflicted love story of a Pangal woman whose excessive acceptance of orthodox Meitei culture in pursuit of a love relationship with a Meitei man ends tragically. This eponymous heroine and the cross-religious love story of yesteryears somewhere left problematic cultural and religious dominance of Meitei over Pangal and also marked a certain type of representation of Pangal in mainstream art and literature till date.