How to go viral on the web with a tortoise

In the '90s, being on TV was everything. Most of all, it could help you become a celebrity. Cut to the 21st century. Social media is the new medium for young people to get recognised, even popular. The level of madness required, however, is not always directly proportional to the number of "likes" you can get. In an increasingly intolerant country like ours, as a young man recently learnt, one can simply not play with a tortoise. Get it?

Mohammed Muthakabir (22), also known as Fazal Sheikh, from Hyderabad, learnt it the hard way. All the guy did was jump over a fence into an enclosure where a tortoise was waiting to become the next biggest sensation on the web. This was not the first time Muthakabir got a picture clicked with a wild being, however. The issue came to light after Muthakabir posted photographs on his Facebook page. One photo showed Muthakabir, wearing black jeans, purple T-shirt and shoes, standing proudly on an 80-year-old male Galapagos tortoise, and the other picture, obviously taken on another day, showed him posing with an emu.

This surely must have given him a rush, and apparently, when he was questioned by the police, he simply stated that he did what he did for fun and to get more likes on Facebook. Little did he know, that you cannot simply walk up to a wild being and get your picture clicked. So the police registered a case against Muthakabir under Section 448 (trespass) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Section 38 of the Wildlife Protection Act. He was produced in court on Thursday and subsequently released on bail. Both Muthakabir and the tortoise made it to the television screens on February, 20, and both eventually ended up being famous, even though it was all for 15 minutes.

Don't you wonder when your moment to get "likes" will come? I certainly do.