India, Feb. 13 -- There is a specific kind of Instagram Reel you can't have missed in the last year. It's man with cat... in a kitchen, out on the patio, at the work desk, on a solo motorcycle ride, along for the bingewatch. Or a man-cat chat in which the mews get hilarious English subtitles. The cat looks deeply unimpressed with. everything, really. But the man? He's the internet's newest soft-masculinity icon.

Aditya Kakodkar (@The.Brewkenstein) has a Marathi-speaking Mau for a sidekick. Aditya Saran (@Adt.Saran) has Hindi-fluent Simba. Other influencers play up their manliness, with their love for cats presented as their one unfortunate weakness. But they're building armies of followers and getting on the brand-collab radar.

Kakodkar...