Meiyang Chang

Meiyang Chang is a contestant and a finalist of Indian Idol 3. He was born on 6 October 1982. He is 24 years old. He is the first Indian contestant of Chinese origin to reach the top 5 of the Indian Idol 3 singing competition. He is a dentist by profession and was born in Dhanbad, Jharkhand. He is a third generation Chinese whose grandparents came to India from Hubei province in China many years ago.

Early life
His father of Chinese origin is a dentist originally from Patna and his mother, Gaichen Chang, is a beautician originally from Mumbai. Both of his parents are now based in Dhanbad occupied with their respective professions. Chang used to listen to Ghazals and old Shammi Kapoor songs from his parents' music collections. He admits that he was a bathroom singer as a young boy and not particularly good at singing in tune. A couple of friends advised him to go for professional training in singing because they liked his voice. He has never been trained in singing and thought that he inherited the singing talent from his father. Apart from education in Dhanbad, he also went to Mussourie, Dehradun and Bangalore for his education. Apart from singing, he also is very interested in sketching cartoons, reading novels and acting in plays.

Audition
Chang went to audition for the Indian Idol 3 competition where he performed the song, Gunji Si Hain. His audition impressed the judges with one judge by the name of Anu Malik saying that his voice is magical and he would make it into the top 5 of the competition. On being selected in the audition, he got so delighted and celebrated by jumping into the swimming pool and on being insisted by the other contestants, he jumped into it again.

Performance
Chang has managed to maintain his performance and reached the top 5 of the competition. But his passage to the final 5 was not without any criticism from the judges. He was once criticized for not concentrating on his singing. He also has some occasional slip ups. His fluent Hindi which is not common for people of Chinese origin living in India and his "cute looks" has managed to give him a novelty advantage over the other contestants ensuring that the female supporters will vote for him.

According to the official website of Indian Idol 3, he has performed the following songs:

Fans and Supporters
Chang has become a hero of sort for the Chinese communities living in India, the majority of which are concentrated in the city of Kolkata. His presence and performance in the Indian Idol competition has earned him not only the support and appreciation of his own communities but also that of other Indian communities. This goes to show the secular nature of the Indian people for accepting him as one of their own and showing their support for him. Chang’s mother was reported to have petitioned the Chinese community to support his son in the competition. This has met with a positive response from the local Chinese club with the club secretary declaring the community intention to do their utmost to support him with their votes.

Elimination
Chang was eliminated on 25 August 2007 after reaching the top 5 of the competition. It was reported as a shocking elimination as he performed well the night before and so did Amit Paul, another hot favorite contestant who was also in the danger zone. One of the judges, Alisha Chinai, was so shocked by his elimination and prompted her to leave the stage in protest and in tears. Later she came back on stage on the request of Chang, she gave him her favorite baseball cap and watched his last performance on the Indian Idol stage prompting quite a few people to shed their tears. He came back to make a special appearance on 30 August 2007 in Indian Idol because of popular demand according to the host and also sang one of the songs he sang in the competition. He also indicated that he has visited Alisha, who has chosen not to appear as a judge because of his elimination, so as to request her to return to the show as the judge.