The storm created by aspiring actress Sri Reddy’s allegations of “casting couch” in Telugu film industry has now taken a major political twist pitting the leading film actor turned politician Pawan Kalyan against the major Telugu media houses and ruling Telugu Desam party. What started with Sri Reddy’s “nude” protest in Hyderabad against alleged sexual exploitation by some members of the film industry has now taken a completely different turn.
The new phase of controversy started with Pawan Kalyan’s advise to Sri Reddy that if she had a problem she should move to police stations and not to the TV studios. A mercurial Sri Reddy lashed back at the actor in an abusive and profane language targeting Pawan Kalyan’s mother. The clips of her abuse was carried loud and clear by many Telugu TV channels including ABN Andhra Jyothy, TV9 and TV5. They also showed the dramatic footage of Sri Reddy hitting herself with her slipper for once calling Pawan Kalyan “brother”.
After keeping quiet for a few days, Pawan Kalyan hit 0back in his own style. Apart from condemning the starlet for abusing his mother, he also lashed out at the three TV channels and some newspapers as well as the Telugu Desam party leaders. He suspected the hand of Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, his son Nara lokesh and others behind the splashes in Telugu media against him.
While the political angle to this fight was clear as Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena Party was taking on Telugu Desam party in Andhra Pradesh to emerge as a major political force in the run up to 2019 elections, a caste color was also added to the controversy.
All the three TV channels named by Pawan Kalyan are owned by the powerful media moghuls from Kamma and Kshatriya castes and they are all close to Chandrababu Naidu. The Kapu caste to which Pawan belongs has a running feud with these castes in coastal Andhra belt. In his no hold barred campaign against the media houses, Pawan also received the support of his family which includes brothers Chiranjeevi and Naga Babu and the nephews Ram Charan Teja and All Arjun. At one stage all of them gathered at the Telugu Film Chambers office to lodge their protest against the abuse of their mother.
Pawan also gave vent to his anger through a barrage of tweets and challenged the heads of ABN Andhra Jyothi and TV9 to show the video clips of the profane language to their own months, wives, sisters and daughters.
Angry fans of Pawan Kalyan hit back by vandalizing the OB van of ABN channel. In his latest series of tweets Pawan Kalyan said that those had publicly insulted and humiliated him and his mother were now privately saying sorry. “This will not work with me”, he said vowing to further intensifying his fight against the media houses. He called upon his supporters and fans to boycott these channels. “For six months you abuse and do emotional Atyachar (artrocity) on me, my fans, supporters, friends, party cadre, Janasainiks, film industry and as Cherry on Top you abuse my old mother too. You sick minded degenerates and now you send me feelers to apologise privately”, he said.
“Srini Raju owns 88.69% of TV9 investor (sic) who makes money out of slander campaigns on public misery will understand in the days to come what he has done”, he wrote. Pawan also pointed out that Srini Raju was a close relative of film director Ram Gopal Varma, and Ramalinga Raju of Satyam.
Srini Raju has sent a legal notice to Pawan Kalyan on the issue and the actor said he was ready for a long and powerful legal battle against the heads of the channels. “What kind of Nirbhaya Act is needed to protect ourselves from these emotional AtyacharisIJIJ Who run these channels”, he tweeted.
