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Two videos and a few photographs of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) chairman BR Naidu interacting with a woman have gone viral on social media on Sunday, March 1. The videos insinuate a potential extra-marital relationship between the two.
Following the circulation of the videos, former TTD chairman appointed during the previous YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) government Bhumana Karunakar Reddy remarked that Naidu was unfit to hold the office of TTD chairman.
“Either BR Naidu steps down or Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu should remove him from office,” Karunakar Reddy, also a senior leader of the YSRCP, stated, adding that the Tirumala temple’s 94 year old history has been ‘tainted like never before’.
Responding to Karunakar Reddy, BR Naidu said that the woman in the video was a family friend of 30 years and they had been to Shirdi on a pilgrimage. “The photos pertaining to the trip were misused along with morphed images in the video,” he said, maintaining that he would take necessary action on those spreading a smear campaign against him. Naidu added that the videos were morphed using AI and circulated by the YSRCP on purpose to malign him.
Karunakar Reddy however argued that there needs to be a thorough investigation into the issue to determine if the videos were deep fake or not.