Fact Check: BJP Graduate MLC candidate Anji Reddy admits to buying party ticket for Rs 30 crore? Find the facts

In this context, a Telugu news e-clipping has gone viral with the claim that ‘BJP Graduate MLC candidate Anji Reddy has given a mass warning to party leaders and workers.’

The news clipping has the headline, ‘Ticket not given for nothing... I gave 30 crores...!’ This news clipping shows Anji Reddy saying that even if BJP workers do not campaign for him, he will win the election as he is going to distribute Rs 2,000 per vote.

The news clipping further claimed that Anji Reddy said, “I am writing a list of people that are not campaigning for me. After the polling, I will peel each person’s skin. I got the ticket by giving Rs 30 crore to Kishan Reddy, Sanjay and Laxman.”

The viral news clipping has a logo of ‘Telangana News Today’ and a story link. It was shared on Facebook with the caption “ED, IT, CBI, EC systems that have not responded even though he is proclaiming this so directly and publicly. Is there a Constitution in India, or if so, will it be implemented?” (Archive)

Another post sharing the news clipping can be found here. (Archive)

Fact Check

NewsMeter found that the claim is false. The organisation ‘Telangana News Today’ does not exist and its news is fake.

We did not find any credible news articles or social media posts that stated that BJP MLC candidate Anji Reddy said he purchased the MLC ticket. We also could not find any credible information showing that he gave a warning to party leaders and workers.

We found that Anji Reddy took to social media to respond to the viral claim.

He dismissed the news clipping as fake news calling it the propaganda of the Congress party. “I entered the fray strongly because of the service I have done and the ideology I believe in. The Congress candidate is misleading the people with fake news because he is not being able to face them fairly,” he said in the post.

NewsMeter spoke to Anji Reddy’s election team. They too dismissed the claim as fake news. They identified the image from the viral news clipping as being taken at a graduate teacher’s conference held at Pitlam Mandal Centre of Kamareddy district.

The photo was shared by Anji Reddy on Facebook on February 20, 2025.

“Today, I participated in the election campaign meeting for the Graduate and Teacher MLC elections held at Pitlam Mandal Centre in Kamareddy District. Former MP from Zaheerabad BB Patil, Kamareddy District BJP president Neelam Chinna Rajulu, mandal-level leaders and activists attended the event,” he wrote in the caption.

This is not the first time fake news from the non-existent news organisation ‘Telangana News Today’ has gone viral.

NewsMeter previously wrote about the fake news clippings that went viral using this media organisation which does not exist.

When we clicked on the link in the banner, we were directed to pages that didn’t work. This meant that the links did not exist. We also conducted various keyword searches on Google and Bing and found that the Telangana News Today e-paper or its website does not exist anywhere.

Using Whois we also found that the domain ‘telangananewstodaydaily’ has not been registered yet. We searched for the registration for ‘Telangana News Today’ and ‘Telangana News Today Daily’ on the website of the Office of the Registrar of newspapers for India and found that the titles were not registered.

Therefore, we conclude the e-paper by the name of ‘Telangana News Today’ does not exist and the newspaper clippings from this e-paper are fake.

NewsMeter concludes that the news clipping about BJP Graduate MLC candidate Anji Reddy is fake and the viral claim is false