As the August 30 release date of Prabhas's mega budget action thriller "Sahoo" nears, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) has undertaken an aggressive social media campaign against the movie.
The question now being hotly debated in political and film circles is why TDP has resorted to this move.
TDP sources say leaders upset at Prabhas for praising AP CM Jagan Mohan Reddy in one of the interviews given in Chennai recently as part of Sahoo promotional programmes.
When one journo asked about Jagan's rule in the press meet, Prabhas replied Jagan has been doing well and hoped that he will give a new direction and development to AP.
This reportedly irked party leaders and cadre. TDP social media wing is known to be the most active wing on social media platforms.
The TDP people reportedly issued instructions to party's social media wing to take up negative campaign against Sahoo and damage the prospects of the movie.
Leaders is also reportedly angry at Prabhas's uncle and veteran tollywood hero Krishnam Raju, who lashed out at Naidu's rule in the past five years.
Keeping this in mind, leaders reportedly asked social media wing to damage the prospects of Sahoo with negative campaigning.
TDP social media wing has been making postings predicting that Sahoo will be a utter flop because there is a tradition that a hero who acts in Rajamouli's blockbuster will deliver a big flop in the subsequent film and Prabhas will be not be any exception.
It's not new for TDP social media to take up negative campaign on movies whenever a hero distances from TDP or criticises TDP.
They have not spared even Junior NTR earlier, when the latter maintained distance from TDP after 2009 Assembly polls debacle.
TDP social media took up negative campaign on Junior NTR films, which played a key role in some of his movies turning flops later.
One wonders what wrong Prabhas did if he said that YS Jagan was doing good in response to a question posed by a journo and not made any statement praising Jagan or criticsing TDP or Naidu on his own.