Narendra Modi has 5th largest number of `Twitter followers’ among world leaders: report

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vaulted to 5th place among world leaders using the online social networking site Twitter, with nearly five million followers. Modi has now pushed Turkey's president Abdullah Gul and prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, each with more than 4 million followers, into sixth and seventh place, according to a report.

The Twitter list of most followed world leaders on Twitter released on Tuesday by public relations firm Burson-Marsteller show that India's new prime minister (who tweets @NarendraModi), with nearly five million followers, has pushed Turkey's president Abdullah Gul (@cbabdullahgul) and prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan (@RT_Erdogan), each with more than 4 million followers, into sixth and seventh place.

Modi's sudden rise in Twitter profile and the steady use of Twitter and other networking sites as communication tools show the increasing dependence of government and diplomacy on social networking sites.

Burson-Marsteller has also coined the term `Twiplomacy' for such diplomatic outreach, as a growing number of leaders and governments hop on to social networking sites for communication.

Recognizing Modi's stated belief in the power of technology and social media to communicate with people, the report says, the number of Modi's Twitter followers could swell with the spread of the use of social media.

However, Modi may have to go a long way to beat US president (@BarackObama), who tops the world-leader list with 43 million followers. Pope Francis (@Pontifex) is a distant second with 14 million followers on his nine different language accounts. Indonesia's president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (@SBYudhoyono) in the third place. With more than 5 million followers, he recently surpassed fourth placed president Obama's official administration account @WhiteHouse.

Modi joined Twitter on 1 October 2009, and has essayed nearly 5,300 tweets, averaging 6.31 tweets a day. He follows 1,045 people, and 95 per cent of his tweets are retweeted. His most popular tweet followed his electoral triumph on 16 May, when he tweeted: India has won! Acche din aane waley hain [good days are coming] - Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) May 16, 2014.

That message was retweeted more than 70,000 times and favourited by 46,000 people.

The report also says since becoming prime minister, Mode has made diplomatic overtures on Twitter to a number of foreign leaders and he is mutually connected with Japan's prime minister @AbeShinzo and Bhutan's prime minister @TsheringTobgay.

US president @BarackObama and @WhiteHouse are the most popular among their peers, followed by 222 and 179 peers, respectively. But they are giving most other world leaders the cold shoulder. @BarackObama mutually follows only two other world leaders, namely Norway's prime minister @Erna_Solberg and Russia's Dmitry Medvedev (@MedvedevRussiae). The @WhiteHouse is mutually connected with only two other leaders: @MedvedevRussiae and the UK government (@Number10gov).