Vijay in a still from the video. (courtesy: YouTube)
Highlights
- "The society is in danger," Vijay Deverakonda tweeted
- The actor also got a shout out from Sandeep Reddy Vanga
- "I stand by you, brother," wrote Mahesh Babu
Arjun Reddy star Vijay Deverakonda and a hashtag he floated, #KillGossipWebsites, have been trending on Twitter ever since he called out some reports on his COVID-19 donations as "fake news" and as allegedly trying to "destroy his career and image." Sharing a video message on Twitter, the actor wrote: "When someone who is supposed to be the guardian of truth lies to you or betrays your trust, intentionally - the society is in danger. This video is my responsibility to my people. Meanwhile, you are welcome to continue trying to end my career, destroy my image, write nonsense about me." Vijay added the hashtags #KillGossipWebsites, #SpreadPositivity and #KillFakeNews to his posts.
Read Vijay Deverakonda's post here:
In the video, Vijay called out the websites and shared screenshots from their reports. One of the articles was titled: "Vijay Deverakonda insulting poor people." The article questioned the actor's charitable organisation The Deverakonda Foundation's fund dedicated to middle class families, writing, "The calculations of the Middle Class Funds started by Vijay Deverakonda with Rs 25 lakh corpus fund appears to be confusing." Another article was titled "Is Vijay Deverakonda not part of film industry?" The actor signed off the video with screenshots of people lauding the The Deverakonda Foundation along with statistics of the number of donations made and the total amount raised.
Vijay Deverakonda went as far as to share a spreadsheet of his contributions to the COVID-19 fund on Twitter. The actor got a big shout out from members of the southern film fraternity.
Earlier, Vijay Deverakonda shared this tweet:
Telugu superstar Mahesh Babu was the first actor to give a shout out to Vijay's campaign, He tweeted: "I stand by you, brother" and added the hashtags #KillFakeNews #KillGossipWebsites." He accompanied his tweet with a note that read, "It takes years of hard work, effort, patience, passion, and sacrifice to earn the love and respect of the people. You work to be the husband your wife deserves, the superhero father your kids want you to be, and the superstar your fans crave for. And then, some faceless person, ready to do anything for money, disrespects you, lies to readers, and spreads misinformation, all for his next paycheck. I want to protect our beautiful industry Of Telugu cinema, I want to protect my fans and I want to protect my kids from a world where this is considered normal. I call upon the industry to act upon these fake websites that live off us and disrespect and lie about us collectively."
Baahubali star Rana Daggubati tweeted: "Spoken out well my man. I stand by you!"
Sandeep Reddy Vanga who directed Vijay in the super hit film Arjun Reddy, wrote: "Alloys are a homogeneous mixture of two or more metallic elements like iron, steel, bronze and titanium to achieve a greater strength to withstand against all sorts of calamities, corrosion and chemical reactions and you have a pair made out of it grinning face. Great and gutsy."
Allari Naresh also extended his support to the actor and tweeted: "Well said Vijay. Completely with you. We are here doing what we do at the cost of losing precious time with our loved ones - only to wake up to baseless rumours. Our silence cannot be your weapon. #KillFakeNews #SpreadPositivity."
Filmmaker Vamsi tweeted: "To whom so ever it may concern... Do not take our patience and silence for granted. #KillFakeNews #killGossipWebsites."
Vijay Deverakonda made his debut with the 2011 film Nuvvila. However, his breakout performance was in the 2016 film Pelli Choopulu. He is best-known for his performances in films like Sandeep Reddy Vanga's Arjun Reddy, Ye Mantram Vesave, Mahanati, Nadigaiyar Thilagam and Geetha Govindam, to name a few. On the work front, the actor was last seen in Dear Comrade.