OREANDA-NEWS. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Wikileaks founder Julian Assange are the frontrunners of TIME Magazine’s Person of the Year Reader’s Poll, coming at 11 per cent and 9 per cent respectively.

Modi’s popularity is on the rise, as he is engaged in a battle against corruption in the financial sector; he recently ratified the Paris Climate Agreement.

BRICS leaders are not only no strangers to these online platforms, but some of the most popular politicians on them.

Modi has over 37 million likes on Facebook and 24 million followers on Twitter. The Indian Prime Minister’s Office, a separate Facebook page, has over 12 million likes – making Modi the second most popular politician on the internet second only to Obama.

Putin, who was last year voted the most popular leader in the world, has 715,000 likes on Facebook and 493,000 Twitter followers – in English.

The Chinese are markedly absent from mainstream social media, but President Xi’s first message out on Weibo, a platform similar to Twitter, wishing people a happy new year in 2015 went viral.

South African President Jacob Zuma has 415,000 followers on Twitter and nearly 100,000 likes on Facebook, trailing behind all other BRICS leaders including Brazilian President Michel Temer who has 685,000 Twitter followers and 520,000 likes on Facebook.