Munnabhai makes Mahatma netizens' top search

Munnabhai and his 'Gandhigiri' seem to have helped the country rediscover the ideals of the father of the nation who has emerged as the most popular political leader searched for on the internet.

Among the most popular searches for the year 2007, Mahatma Gandhi has been ranked ahead of ex-President A P J Abdul Kalam and President Pratibha Patil, who figure on the list of top ten political leaders compiled by online search giant Google.

Kalam has been ranked at the second position, Indira Gandhi occupies the fourth position, while Patil is at sixth position.

The list also features Rabindranath Tagore (5th), Subhash Chandra Bose (7th), Sarojini Naidu (9th) and Mayawati (10th).

In an accompanying list of top ten sportstars, Indian tennis sensation Sania Mirza emerged as the most popular, followed by Russian champion Maria Sharapova; cricket phenomenon Sachin Tendulkar; WWF wrestler John Cena; British football star David Beckham; Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo; cricketers Rahul Dravid, MS Dhoni, Sourav Ganguly and Russian tennis player Anna Kournikova.

Google said that tennis, cricket and football players were the most popular sports stars searched by Indians.

When it comes to the tinsel town, silver screen beauties have upstaged the male actors with Aishwarya Rai ruling the hearts and minds of the Indians.

Om Shanti Om girl Deepika Padukone has also earned a spot in the top 10. Rai was followed by Salman Khan, Hrithik Roshan, Katrina Kaif and Shahrukh Khan in the top five.

While Amitabh Bachchan and his son Abhishek did not feature on the list, Mallika Sherawat made it to the sixth position, followed by Priyanka Chopra, Kareena Kapoor and Rani Mukherjee in the top ten.

Talking of movies, Hollywood flick Spiderman and South Indian superstar Rajnikanth's Sivaji outranked Bollywood hits like Om Shanti Om, Chak De India and Dhoom 2, in the top five on the list.

Saawariya was ranked at 6th position, followed by Harry Potter, Ghost Rider, Bhool Bhulaiyya and Jhoom Barabar Jhoom.

When it comes to top 10 portals, Google's social networking site Orkut emerged as the most popular, followed by YouTube and Gmail. "Social networking tops the list, followed closely by other platforms of online communications and interaction", the reports said.

Google itself was ranked at 5th position, followed by Indian Railways, Yahoo Mail and Zapak among others.

Among the top ten places of interest, Kerala came on top, followed by Singapore, Goa, Australia, London, Dubai, Rajasthan, Jaipur, Kashmir and Ooty.