On his brother Arbaaz Khan's say-so Salman Khan reluctantly joined the rapidly-growing brigade of stars on a major social networking website. But Salman says he will tweet mainly in Hindi. Is that a whim, ask the cynics. Or is this Salman's way of connecting with the heartland? According to a colleague, Salman wants to use the Twitter space to have his say fearlessly.
Apparently, Salman's tweets won't be about his day-to-day activities but larger issues that touch the common man. Says Arbaaz, "Salman has started tweeting in Hindi. But it doesn't mean he will only use that language. We'll just have to see which way he goes." The decision to tweet was suddenly taken by Salman on Tuesday morning.
Relates Arbaaz, "As you know everything Salman does is spontaneous and emotional. I had been urging him to join the social networks on the internet. I am on a number of them and I kept telling Salman that if he gets on the social network, he can connect directly with his fans, tell them about his films and about whatever else he wants to."
But Salman desisted. "He isn't net savvy at all. He isn't even comfortable on the cellphone but on Saturday he saw me on Twitter and decided on the spur of the moment to join. He said, "Chalo karte hain." The first message went out on Tuesday morning. Within half an hour he had 2,000 followers."
Incidentally, with Salman falling prey to the social-networking obsession, there are only two Bollywood A-listers who aren't tweeting. Ranbir Kapoor and Katrina Kaif. The two insists they would never go on Twitter.
Never say never.