From being a niche Cartier to a popular Nirma, that's what Abhishek Mishra wants to be. In Jankipuram, a locality that was included in Lucknow North after the delimitation exercise, Mishra walks from door to door, urging voters to lend him their support.

It's the difference in approach that gives away the fact that the first time politician is also a former professor of strategy at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, and has a PhD degree from University of Cambridge. His poll pitch - that he will focus on providing good educational facilities for the masses, set the drainage system in order, increase employment opportunities and ensure basic civic amenities to people - is made in crisp English.

The uniqueness apart, it's difficult to say whether the 'difference' will cut much ice with the voting public. Mishra, however, is confident. ``There are over 10,000 firsttime voters in my constituency. I believe they will look at the profile of the candidates before they cast their votes. Other voters too, I hope, compare candidates just like they would, a product, before buying it from a super market.

They choose the one that works the best.'' Son of JS Mishra, an IAS officer of the UP cadre currently on Central deputation, Mishra is pitted against the more experienced politicians like Congress's Dr Neeraj Bora and BJP's Gopalji Tandon. Mishra, however, says he sees no competition when it comes to his ability to strategise or implement policies to raise the standards of living for his voters.

If he were to be voted to power, key concerns he will address, he says include erecting a flyover at the Daliganj railway crossing, constructing a substation for the constituency, providing a government school in Jankipuram, a dam in Faizullaganj and enhancing compensation to famers whose land was acquired by the LDA for development. Ask him what made an academician, with no history of politics, decide in favour of contesting the assembly polls and Mishra has a prompt answer:" Very often, people have drawing room conversations about how"good'' people should enter politics. Akhilesh Yadav told me I am someone who can make a change. It's true that the desire existed before he asked me; his words, however, were the trigger.''