Who are the shining stars of the Indian celebrity Twitter firmament? Lounge trawled through dozens of Twitter accounts before picking a few for perusal. As far as we know, they look authentic and they are updated often enough. After all, what good is eavesdropping if it ain’t the real stuff?
Mallika Sherawat
URL: twitter.com/mallikala
Stats*: 757 updates, 7,588 followers
What’s it about? Extension of the carefully crafted Mallika Sherawat persona. Her tweets are fun and she interacts extensively with her tweeple. But Sherawat being Sherawat, she can never refrain from the occasional sexually-overloaded quip. When user @ahmeds027 asked: “how does one identify a beautiful vampire from a benign beauty?” Sherawat said: “only 1 will suck you dry”. Nice.
Follow-worthy? Totally. Sherawat updates often and will reply if you amuse her enough.
Priyanka Chopra
URL: twitter.com/priyankachopra
Stats: 118 updates, 6,635 followers
What’s it about? Entirely about life of a movie star. Expect plenty of plugs for her movies.
Follow-worthy? Only if you can handle the frequent references to Kaminey release dates and What’s Your Raashee? shoot session. But then one day Priyanka Chopra just might reply to your tweet.
Gul Panag
URL: twitter.com/gulpanag
Stats: 4,706 updates, 8,867 followers
What’s it about? Gul Panag tweets aplenty about news, social causes and even technology. And expect plenty of pictures of film locations, her dog and co-stars.
Follow-worthy? It is her frequency of updates and quality of content that has made Panag the unlikley queen of the Indian twitterdom. And no unnecessary diva airs or movie plugging.
Barkha Dutt
URL: twitter.com/bdutt
Stats: 251 updates, 2,261 followers
What’s it about? The life of a high-profile journalist, occasional gossip on people and places, and plenty of interaction. But Barkha Dutt’s account is devoid of revelations.
Follow-worthy? Only for die-hard fans and news junkies. And for anyone who likes to interact. Most of Dutt’s recent posts have been responses to fans.
Shashi Tharoor
URL: twitter.com/shashitharoor
Stats: 527 updates, 16,529 followers
What’s it about? Opinion on sports and news interspersed with thoughts on the grind of being a minister of state and member of Parliament. Shashi Tharoor, somehow, has time to respond to fans.
Follow-worthy? Highly recommended for the rare, unfiltered insight into life in the highest strata of the political system. Tharoor does not mince words when he is upset by the media misreporting and tweets as much. And, if you’re lucky, he might respond as well.
Notable mentions: Rahul Gandhi’s alleged account (@rgamethi) has, as of now, vanished. The last update was on 28 April and, last we checked, it had 2,220 followers. Pritish Nandy (@pritishnandy) updates frequently about movies, books and media, and is quite interactive with followers. For a daily report on the most popular Twitter users in India, hottest topics and most popular links, go to www.90di.com/twitter
* All stats as of 5pm on 16 July.