'Killing Veerappan' is yet to hit the screens in Telugu, but the movie based on the events leading up to the elimination of Veerappan has become very popular on social media and in film-related press.

A day before its actual release in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, a catchy publicity technique is creating a strong buzz around the film.

Making this possible are celebrities like Puri Jagannadh (a priya shishya of RGV) and Puneeth Rajkumar (incidentally, his brother Shivrajkumar plays a key role in this maiden Kannada film of RGV). Riteish Deshmukh is another actor who is posing for, what RGV calls, "storm in a tea cup."

RGV is gung-ho about sharing the pics of Puri, Puneeth and others on his micro-blogging account where we see them posing with a tea cup half across their face.

Going by the popularity of this movie, it is all set to kick-start the year with a hit, after 'Nenu Sailaja', of course.