Holiday miracles: Fishmonger’s family pray for a Christmas chart topper

Appeal to people to give the song as many hits as possible.

PATTOKI: The mother of Pakistani internet sensation One Pound Fish Man is praying to Allah that her son has a Christmas No 1 hit so his wife and children can join him for a new life in Britain.

The original video has had a staggering 4.6 million hits, while the professionally produced one already has more than two million.

Muhammad Shahid Nazir has also gained nearly 28,000 followers on Twitter.

When Nazir left his four children behind in Pakistan to study business in London, he could never have imagined he would one day be cavorting in a Warner video with scantily-clad Western beauties, singing about fish.

Nazir, who got a job as a fishmonger in east London's Queens Market in Upton Park, came up with a song to entice customers in which he urged local women to part with one for a single, glistening fresh fish.

“Come on ladies, come on ladies, one pound fish,” he croons. “Very, very good one pound fish, very very cheap one pound fish.”

Shoppers were charmed and after someone filmed a video and uploaded it on YouTube the song went viral and Warner Music offered Nazir a record deal. Soon after, a slicker version with Nazir shimmying and strutting Bollywood-style went up on December 10, launching the race to top the Christmas charts in Britain.

Back at the family home in Pattoki, a small town 234 kilometres south of Islamabad, his delighted 67-year-old mother Kalsoom says she is praying and fasting for Nazir's success.

"I appeal to people in Pakistan and abroad to give this song as many hits as possible. I am fasting and saying special prayers for my son so that his song appears as number one," she told AFP at the affluent family home.

Nazir's family run their own business in Pattoki where they settled after migrating from India. Today, they say they have been nicknamed locally as the ‘One Pound Fish’ family.

Kalsoom says that if Nazir obtains a work visa, he should take his wife and children with him to Britain. However, British newspaper The Sunday Times reported this month that Nazir is under investigation by the Home Office over a potential breach of the terms of his student visa after he ditched his studies to work as a fishmonger.

Nazir's wife Kashifa describes him as a “loving husband and father” despite his departure for London in May last year. She, along with the rest of the family, hopes that he will soon be back for a visit.