Tension within the Tollywood community continues to simmer ahead of the upcoming Movie Artists Association (MAA) elections, scheduled tentatively for September this year.
Actor Hema, who is reportedly planning to contest for the post of MAA president, today made some shocking allegations against the present president, actor Vijaya Krishna Naresh, in a letter addressed to each of the 200 members of the association.
Without directly naming him, she first alleged that "some people" were trying to postpone the upcoming elections to "hold on to their positions", and then went on to say, "Out of a total corpus of Rs 5 crore, the present president of the MAA has only spent Rs 3 crore so far. I would like to ask him what he has done with the remaining funds."
Further, reiterating that Naresh was trying to "cling on to his post" Hema also gathered signatures from other MAA members in order to prevent any possible postponement of the elections.
Naresh's tenure as MAA president has been marred by controversy. Last year, a disciplinary committee, comprising senior actors Krishnam Raju, Chiranjeevi, Murali Mohan and Jayasudha, had asked him to go on a 41-day leave after many association members had complained that no work was being done by him.
Meanwhile, it is becoming increasingly clear that this year's MAA elections will be a heated contest - reports say that four other prominent members from the film fraternity, Prakash Raj, Vishnu Manchu, C V L Narasimha Rao, and Jeevitha Rajasekhar, are currently in the fray for the post of president.
Prakash Raj's announcement that he would be contesting for the post has elicited strong responses within Tollywood with some pointing out that he hails from "outside" (Raj is from Karnataka). However, many others have spoke in support of the senior actor.
The tension of the upcoming elections has also led to other rows and controversies. Recently, producer and actor Konidela Nagendra Babu had remarked that under the current MAA office bearers, the body had become
"lacklustre" and "lacking in decency". His comments prompted incumbent president Naresh to provide "proof" of all the activities undertaken by the association over the last four years.