SMTP losing mail format

I am using the following codes to send mails, the problem that I am having is when I am including $body in $smtp->datasend (as shown)
all data losing its format for instance if $body is
aaaaaa
bbbbbb
cccccc
dddddd
I get mail as aaaaaabbbbbbccccccdddddd

Note if I do not use SMTP as HTML everything is ok

use lib '/perl/lib';
use Net::SMTP;
use strict;
my @mails;
open FILE, "<$basename";
{
  local $/='The people below:';
  while( <FILE> ){
    chomp;
    next unless my ($manager) = /Manager\s*:\s*(.*)/;
      my @manager = (split(/\W/, $manager));
      my $first_name = $manager[0];
      my $second_name = $manager[2];
    next unless my ($to) = /Email\s*:\s*(.*)/;
    push(@mails,[$to,$_]);
  }
}
close (FILE);

foreach(@mails){
  send_mail($_->[0],$_->[1]);
}
sub send_mail{
  my ($to,$body) = @_;
  my $smtp = Net::SMTP->new('server123');
  $smtp->mail( 'address@mail.com' );
  $smtp->to($to); # recipient's address
  $smtp->data(); # Start the mail
 
# Send the header.

$smtp->datasend("Subject: Updates My Home\n");
  $smtp->datasend("To: $to\n");
  $smtp->datasend("CC: 'newaddress@hotmail.com'\n");
  $smtp->datasend("From: mark name");
  $smtp->datasend("Content-Type: text/html\n");
  $smtp->datasend("\n");

  # Send the body.

  $smtp->datasend(("<b>Hello</b>, <font color=blue>$body<font>\n");
}

$smtp->dataend();                  
        $smtp->quit;