by Naxal Hattisar

    KATHMANDU, Dec. 25 (Xinhua) -- Nepali film director Dayaram Dahal is planning to celebrate his two decades in the industry and40th film by venturing into uncharted waters.

    The 38-year-old is now ready to make the first film from Nepal on the hijacking of an Indian aircraft 10 years ago.

    On Xmas Eve, 1999, five people, who managed to smuggle weapons undetected on a Kathmandu-New Delhi flight operated by India's national carrier Indian Airlines, hijacked the aircraft with nearly 180 passengers, demanding money from the Indian government and the release of select prisoners from Indian jails.

    The aircraft was finally taken to Kandahar in Afghanistan where it was released after the then Indian external affairs minister Jaswant Singh negotiated for the release of the hostages.

    One of the passengers was killed by the hijackers, apparently over the delay in refueling during a forced landing.

    The victim, Rupin Katyal, was returning from Nepal with his wife, Rachana. They had been married for about a week and had gone to Nepal to spend their honeymoon.

    The incident badly affected Nepal's tourism industry after the Indian government suspended flights to Nepal and the number of tourists fell drastically.

    Now, a decade after the air drama, which was remembered in India Thursday, Dahal is writing a script for his upcoming film that will revolve round the woman widowed during the hijack.

    In his tale, the widow gives birth to a son, who grows up into an angry young man who is always questioning why his father was killed, even before he was born.

    As a boy, teachers can't deal with his aggression in school and as a young man, he is ready to let fly with his fists.

    In his film, Dahal makes the mother and son return to Nepal and they run into another hijack, which however ends with the hijackers coming to a bad end due to the young man's resilience.

    Besides the psychology of the widow and her family, Dahal says his film will also portray the trauma undergone by another victim, Gajendra Tamrakar, a Nepali actor, who was on the same flight.

    Though he too suffered during the ordeal, he was however misrepresented as being the hijackers' accomplice.

    "Later, it was found that he was not really linked to the hijackers," Dahal says. "As a member of the same industry, my heart went out to the elderly actor who suffered so much mental agony though he was actually a victim, like the others."

    The Nepali film director has also included the victimized man's character in his film, which will be shot in Nepal, near the international airport in Kathmandu, in Amritsar city in India, where the plane landed for refueling, and hopefully, also in Kandahar.

    Dahal says he has asked the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai for permission to shoot in Kandahar as he wants to make his film as realistic as possible.

    In India, two directors have already made films on the subject from the Indian perspective.

    "Zameen" (Ground) was made by Bollywood director Rohit Shetty and released in 2003 while last year, Kunal Shivdasani debuted with "Hijack".