Stand up comedian Manoj Prabakar, who is associated with a popular comedy collective in Chennai, was a part of a mock awards show that was put up at various venues across Chennai and Bangalore, last year. The show had comedians organising a mock-award show on the lines of the Raspberry Awards that precede the Oscar awards.
It had comedians giving away various awards with innovative names like Worst Climax, Best acting by a non-living object, best sequel, etc., During one of those segments, comedian Manoj made jokes about Mahesh Babu's acting and his expressions.
There were jokes about Spyder being Mahesh Babu's first Tamil film, and all the negatives about that movie. Following this, the fans of Mahesh Babu took to Social media to abuse and threaten the above mentioned comedian. Soon after this controversy broke out, he posted an apology on facebook saying:
"Hello again,
This is to all the Telugu cinema fans and Mr. Mahesh Babu fans and to Mr. Mahesh Babu himself. As I already mentioned in the previous post, everything and anything told was not personal and I have nothing against the actor or his followers. If at all if anything was hurtful or if it did hurt anyone’s sentiment, then it wasn’t intentional and my sincere SORRY and APOLOGIES for the same. I sincerely hope this clarifies everything and you all will consider this. So I believe everything will stop from now and we can move on with our lives. Thank you very much for your kind understanding.
Peace"
The issue doesn't seem to stop, as the Movie Artists Association (MAA) have written a press statement, urging the Nadigar Sangam to take necessary action against the comedian.
“We were extremely shocked when a comedian named Manoj Prabhakar had made extremely derogatory remarks about Superstar Mahesh Babu, about his personality, about his acting talents, in an awards function which has created furor in the southern states igniting bad vibrations about the friendly Tamil film industry. Though these are irresponsible comments of an individual, we fear that this will reflect to a certain extent on the esteemed Nadigar Sangam,” the letter reads.
Find the full letter below: