In a very breaking development, covert news investigation website, Cobrapost, carried out a series of sting operation among some popular names in Bollywood industry. Called 'Operation Karaoke', the purpose of the mission was to expose if Bollywood celebs would fall for the temptation of money and use their social media influence to promote political parties in the upcoming elections. The operation looks to have been carried out last year and the videos were all revealed on February 29.

36 Bollywood actors, singers and directors have been exposed in the sting operation where they have agreed to take money from the team, who posed as a PR agency. Primary among those were actors like Jackie Shroff, Shakti Kapoor, Sonu Sood, Sunny Leone, Mahima Chaudhary, Ameesha Patel, Rohit Roy, Vivek Oberoi, Shreyas Talpade, Puneet Issar, television actors Hiten Tejwani, Gauri Pradhan, singers, Mika Singh, Abhijeet Bhattacharya and others. Cobrapost Sting Operation Karaoke Claims 36 Bollywood Celebs Accept Money to Promote Political Parties - Watch Shocking Videos.

However, the Cobrapost blog, which you can read here, also claimed that they had also approached Arshad Warsi, Vidya Balan, Raza Murad and Saumya Tandon with similar offers. The report says that "While we saw all these celebs succumbing to the lure of money and agreeing to indulge in this unethical and unlawful practice, there were some notable exceptions, though. When we approached Vidya Balan, Arshad Warsi, Raza Murad and Saumya Tandon with our proposition, these celebs chose to go by their conscience and straightaway refused to play ball." Vidya Balan's Captivating Look On Filmfare's February 2019 Edition Will Convince You That 40 is the New Sexy! (View Pic).

Ever since the videos went online, social media users are shocked by how easily fallible some of the stars are. And there are others who praised Arshad, Vidya, Raza and Saumya for keeping their integrity intact. Check out some of those tweets below:

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Some Twitter users are of the opinion that the Cobrapost expose hasn't taken down the creme de la creme of Bollywood, notably the A-listers. Writer-Editor Apurva Asrani had tweeted, "Almost all the big names approached by #OperationKaraoke refused to sell their souls. It's mostly the small fries, the 'has beens', who sold out. And while actors are known to dance for money, an exposè on news professionals who wreak havoc with paid news would be the real deal." Well, small fries or not, this operation, if authentic, did expose how easy it is for political parties to 'buy' out some celebs. And of course, there are the ones like Arshad, Vidya, Saumya and Raza Murad left who keep the flag waving high with their conduct.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 19, 2019 06:31 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).