Tollywood, the Telugu film industry which is the biggest after Hindi and Tamil, has launched a social media campaign to fight fake news and gossip writing.

Tollywood actor Vijay Devarkonda’s angry reply to a report published in a website triggered a trend in the microblogging site Twitter, with over 85,000 tweets since he tweeted yesterday a video as his response to the report.

Tollywood top actors Mahesh Babu, Ravi Teja, Rana Daggubati, Radhika Saratkumar, Rashi Khanna and directors Anil Ravipudi and Vamsi Padipally have tweeted their support with the two hashtags — #KillFakeNews and #SpreadPositivity — lending their voice to Vijay’s call to fight fake news, gossiping and reports that tarnish the images of celebrities.

Retweeting Vijay's tweet, Rana Daggubati said Suresh Productions, the film production company that his family owns, too would back his fight.

The actor, who shot to limelight after back-to-back hits Pelli Choopulu and Arjun Reddy , keyed in two hashtags #KillFakeNews and #SpreadPositivity.

“When someone who is supposed to be the guardian of truth lies to you and betrays your trust intentionally, the society is in danger,” Vijay said, while posting a YouTube video to counter the report.

The website report made comments against the actor’s fund-raising campaign to provide financial help to the distressed during the Covid-19 crisis.

Vijay’s campaign, however, attracted criticism from some fans of actor-politician Pawan Kalyan. They alleged that none of the Tollywood personalities came forward when the latter fought against certain publications and TV channels a few years ago.

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