A video is being circulated with the claim that it depicts the implementation of the ancient ‘Devadasi’ ritual. The video showing the wedding of a couple is being used to claim that this shows a Dalit woman forced to marry a Brahmin under the Devadasi system.
Several social media users posted the video which has a voiceover explaining what the Devadasi system was. It claimed that minor girls were married off to gods in temples, and that is why they were called Devadasis, which means Desi or Servants of the God. It claims that priests in the temple used to exploit such girls, including sexual exploitation, and thus it became legal prostitution.
The voiceover says that while the system was stopped by the initiative of several organisations, it is still practices in several places in Karnataka. While the audio does not claim it directly, it is implied that the video shows a Devadasi marriage.
X user Seema Budh posted the video saying, “Until 1950, Brahmins used the daughters of poor Dalits by making them Devadasis. But why were Hindus not in danger at that time.”
1950 तक गरीब दलितों की बेटियों को देवदासी बना कर ब्राह्मण उनको यूज़ करता था,,
— Seema Budh (@seemabodhi) February 26, 2025
मगर उस समय हिंदू खतरे में क्यूं नहीं था🤔 pic.twitter.com/pMbfKhMvTf
Several other users shared the video with the same or similar text.
1950 तक गरीब दलितों की बेटियों को देवदासी बना कर ब्राह्मण उनको यूज़ करता था,,
— Dinesh Bhardwaj (@bhardwaj2509) February 27, 2025
मगर उस समय हिंदू खतरे में क्यूं नहीं था🤔
pic.twitter.com/JYrBkBiAac
"देवदासी प्रथा का मतलब गरीब दलितों की बेटियों का शोषण ?"
— बसावन इंडिया (@BasavanIndia) February 26, 2025
👇👇👇pic.twitter.com/StW8HKXB9G
However, the fact is that the video does not show a Devadas marriage, it is the video of wedding of Malayalam television actors Kris Venugopal and Divya Sreedhar, which took place in 2024. The couple met while working on the TV serial “Patharamattu” and married in October 2024.
Kris Venugopal is a Malayalam actor, voice artist, and author, and have acted in several movies and TV shows. Divya Sreedhar is a prominent actress in Malayalam TV serials. Despite the look with long white beards, Kris Venugopal is not a Brahmin priest from a temple, and his marriage with Divya was not a Devadasi marriage.
Notably, after the visuals of the wedding went viral last year, the couple was trolled online for the perceived age-difference between them. People claimed that Kris Venugopal is 60 years old and he married a 40-year-old woman. Responding to these claims, Divya had clarified that Kris is 49 while she is 40, so there was an age difference of 9 years, not 20 years as claimed by many including some media reports.
This was Divya’s second marriage and she also has two children from her first marriage.
