Virender Sehwag : I have, in the last six months, made around Rs 30 lakh through my tweets

“I have, in the last six months, made around Rs 30 lakh through my tweets,” Sehwag told the Hindustan Times. “These are all jokes we used to crack with friends and in the dressing room. Once I took to Twitter and shared those jokes, they became a huge hit. My following grew and some of the posts got thousands of retweets. With so many shares, money from sponsors followed.”

The former opener has turned into a social media hit with his 140-character witty jokes. The 38-year-old Sehwag has over 8 million followers on Twitter, and brands are using his popularity to promote their products.

However, there is no blatant promotion of brands from his account, instead he subtly slips them in his tweets. Like when Ravindra Jadeja won the Man of the Match award against England recently, Sehwag tweeted, “Wah Jaddu Bhai! Hamarepaastoh 2000 kechhuttenahi hai auraap @Paytm mein 1 Lakh le gaye. Thoda hamare Paytm meinbhi transfer kijiye”. Paytm are the sponsors of the India-England series.

I’d plough every penny back into improving facilities for the school.

Sehwag

Sehwag is using this money to run a public school that he owns. The cricketer set up a 40-acre Sehwag International School on the Gurugram-Jhajjar highway in 2011 after the then Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda presented him with the lease of the land in recognition of his second triple hundred.

“I lose around a couple of crores every year on the school, but even if I was to make profit from it, I would never use it for myself. I’d plough every penny back into improving facilities for the school. Just as I do with the cricket academies I run around the country. These are not for making money; for that I have other avenues.”