PHUKET: A famous monk surrendered his robes today, his fall from grace brought about by YouTube clips that finally exposed his affair with a married woman on Phuket.

The affair goes back at least a year. The woman and her husband divorced when family members first gathered evidence of it.

But the monk, despite the sins that the relatives had captured on video, went on being a monk at a temple in Phang Nga - until today.

Up to a year ago, the woman, a well-known Phuket resident and businessperson, entertained the monk at her house quite often, and with such frequency as to arouse the suspicions of relatives.

Hiding a video camera in the Phuket family's loungeroom, the reasons for the monk's frequent visits from Phang Nga were revealed.

The woman and the monk were captured in various stages of nakedness, with the woman at one stage dressing playfully in the monk's robes.

Once the woman's infidelity was not just exposed but proven on video, the Phuket couple divorced. But the monk continued his life, as if nothing had changed.

This week, still shots taken from the video were posted on Facebook. Then the video was sent to a news outlet, and posted on YouTube.

At first, the monk's devoted students protested that it could not be their leader. But today, their leader, apparently a good monk in many other ways, resigned.

The YouTube video has since been removed. It was the end of the affair.