“…Competition for friends can be so fierce that some have even resorted to faking friend lists. Sixteen-year-old Mohit Kapoor, for example, has put up 20 benami profiles and keeps scrapping himself daily. "This not only pads the number of scraps I receive, but I can also brag about things indirectly," grins Mohit.
This kind of obsessing before the computer about unreal friends who don't really give a fig about you has unhealthy consequences, especially for introverts who don't have a life in the real world. "There are a lot of people who go online looking for friends because they don't have them elsewhere," says Dr Harish Shetty, a Mumbai-based psychiatrist. "So, the online friends become their universe, and even a slight rejection or snub becomes a big issue."
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This brought back memories of Devyani Chaubal (1942-1995), a film gossip journalist. She reportedly faked friends, stars of Hindi film industry, from Raj Kapoor to Rajesh Khanna.
Subhash Bhende सुभाष भेंडे drew a delightful Marathi word-caricature of her- "Sharmishtha Godambe शर्मिष्ठा गोडांबे"
We may or mayn't know clandestine Mohit Kapoors but we get to know many Sharmishtha Godambes in our life.
I have lost their count.
Artist: Barney Tobey The New Yorker 23 October 1978