Draft:Rajinikanth Vellalacheruvu

Rajinikanth Vellalacheruvu, (born 9 January 1975) (also known as TV9 Rajinikanth) is an Indian journalist. He is the managing editor of TV9 Telugu. He primarily appears as the host of shows Big News Big Debate and Cross Fire.

Career
Rajinikanth started his career as a reporter at Vaartha newspaper. He later worked at Siti Cable and joined TV9 Telugu in 2003 as a special correspondent where he is currently the managing editor.

He interviewed Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy in 2019 before Andhra Pradesh Legislative assembly elections.

Rajinikanth interviewed Revanth Reddy in 2023 before Telangana Assembly elections.

He worked on WOMEN TRAFFICKING IN THE ANANTAPUR-KADAPA-CHITTOOR BELT episodes.

Big News Big Debate with Rajinikanth
Big News Big Debate is a prime-time discussion show hosted by Rajinikanth on daily current affairs.

Cross Fire with Rajinikanth
In 2022, TV9 Telugu started a new format of discussions called Cross Fire with Rajinikanth. The idea of this new program is to have discussions on current issues with well known people from different domains.

Controversies
Vellalacheruvu's tweet after Maruti Rao suicide in March 2020 created controversy online, as he appeared to sympathize with Rao, who had been alleged of murdering his daughter's husband.

Ram Gopal Varma mentioned in his tweets about Rajinikanth spreading false news.

K A Paul has threatened Rajinikanth for his attitude in Interviews and warned of filing defamation case.

Vellalacheruvu received backlash online after he criticized Anandayya Ayurveda medicine.

Awards
In December 2023, Rajinikanth bagged 2 awards in "The News Television Awards 2023" under "Personality category - Prime TV News Anchor - Telugu " and "Programming Awards category - Big News Big Debate - Telugu".