Imran Khan's Facebook fan base swells

May 29, 2011 |

Islamabad

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Imran Khan

Pakistani cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan, also known as ‘Im the Dim’, may have become the butt of jokes for his allegedly hypocritical ways, yet nearly three lakh people, mostly youth, want him to become the next prime minister of his country.

On a fan group created on social networking website Facebook "We want Imran Khan to be the next PM of Pakistan", his fan base is about to touch 300,000.

The page is full of ‘we love you Imran’ and ‘Inshallah you be will be the next PM of Pakistan’ messages.

Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf, who too has used Facebook to interact with fans, is just over a lakh fans ahead of Khan.

Khan's fans are swearing by his name on micro-blogging website Twitter too.

"I do have an icon in my life. And that person is Imran Khan. He is just the light house in my life. My godfather," tweeted Faisal. Another fan called him the ‘last hope for Pakistan’.

However, with Khan's ambivalence on crucial issues plaguing the country, there is no dearth of people making fun of him either.

"Can anybody tell me what Imran Khan is blabbering about here in Karachi today," tweeted Akif Bhamani.

Hamza Baloch said he should ‘run his hospital’, ask for ‘chanda’ (funds) and keep away from politics. Another tweet read: ‘Down with Imran Khan's hypocrisies’. Noted rights activist Ali Dayan's fun tweet "did he make the impossible possible? Did he levitate?" was widely retweeted too.

The latest issue of The Friday Times weekly has a caricature of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief saying, “My name is Imran Khan. And I am not a terrorist!” a take on the Shahrukh Khan-blockbuster ‘My name is Khan’.

Jugnu Mohsin, the woman behind the fictitious character ‘Im the Dim’, wrote for an Indian weekly that Khan is pursuing a doctorate in hypocrisy. "I took my 'O' levels in Hypocrisy when I wrapped up Jemima (his former wife) in a chaddar and presented her to the gullible people of Pakistan...I then got my 'A' levels in Hypocrisy when I entered politics and took a crash course in Double Speak, Double Overs and Double Everything…"

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