It was Mandatory for Us to Blog About Alok Nath, So here it is

Twitter is not just a network where real time communication takes place but also a source of news and social discovery. Millions of users tweet every minute and in this sea of tweets there are some tweets which spark a trend. One such being, “Our nation only learnt about heart attacks because of Alok Nath” which was followed by, “Alok Nath wears sweater in Mumbai because his mom in Punjab felt cold”. Since then a volley of tweets, essentially jibes at the veteran actor swarmed everyone’s timeline on Sunday, December 29th.

These jokes, both funny and crude continued being tweeted and retweeted all through the night, Alok Nath was trending on Twitter by Monday morning. What contributed to the trend apart from the jokes, was a large number of users on Twitter wondering why the Buniyaad actor was suddenly trending.

According to Topsy.com, about 42,706 tweets about Alok Nath were tweeted in the past 30 days, with an obvious spike (i.e 42544 tweets) between 29th December to 1st January. Most of the tweets revolved around the stereotypical characters played by the actor and words like “Sanskaar”, “Kanyadaan”, “Babuji”, “Ashirwaad” etc.

This trend was reported by the likes of TOI, Indian Express and First Post which also quoted Alok Nath saying,

“I think it’s wonderful to be in the news and I am enjoying it. I don’t know what the reason is. Perhaps Hum Saath-Saath Hain was being aired and someone decided to pick on a dialogue about sanskaar and that’s how the trend began,”.

However, living up to his humble on-screen image the actor in fact, enjoyed the jokes and said,

“I am fine with it. In fact, I read many jokes and liked most of them. People have done extensive research and there are many good comments”.

The transference of ideas on social media is a known occurrence, but the fact that within hours of the flurry of tweets on Alok Nath, more than 20 pages titled “Alok Nath Memes” went up on Facebook as well – one of the which currently has 75k + likes – is a sign of the growing popularity of a personality we can all relate to.

Al - Aluminium O - Oxygen K - Potassium Na - Sodium Th - Thorium; Alok Nath is a nuclear vardaan

— Bhak Sala (@bhak_sala) January 3, 2014

 

Alok Nath removes his slippers before playing Temple Run and distributes 'prasad' after crossing each level.

— Sir Ravindra Jadeja (@SirJadeja) December 30, 2013

 

Alok Nath forwards only two types of jokes on Whatsapp: Veg jokes and Jain jokes.

— Hardik Rajgor (@Hardism) December 29, 2013

Now whether this trend lasts a while, or if it fizzles out like the ones that preceded it, only time will tell. But as of now, one thing is for certain: poetry, politics and parties aside, humour transcends all on Twitter.

Hitesh Rajwani, Co-Founder, Dream Simulators has analyzed the content which lead to the buzz around veteran bollywood actor and how content marketers have leveraged the trend to weave a strong social media presence around the theme of #AlokNath Memes. Let's take a look!