Film industry leaders slam CBFC over ‘Jana Nayagan’ censor row

Chennai: Top voices of the Indian film industry have united against the CBFC over its handling of actor-politician Vijay's 'Jana Nayagan', with filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma branding the board "outdated" and actor Sivakarthikeyan highlighting the fallout on Pongal releases.

Prominent Tamil Director Mari Selvaraj, whose films explore caste oppression, was the latest to join in with his X post on Saturday.

He urged fellow creators to “raise a loud voice” against such interventions so that the “spreading fear” over artistic expression could be pushed back, framing the row as a test case for how the state deals with political cinema.

Ram Gopal Varma, in a lengthy X post right after the Madras High Court judgement on Friday evening, said it is “foolish” to believe the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) remains relevant when children access violent content freely online, blaming the industry for sustaining it due to “laziness to debate its relevance”.

CENSOR BOARD is OUTDATED

Not in the context of just @Actor_Vijay ‘s #JanaNayagan ‘s censor issues but in an overall manner, it is truly foolish to think that the censor board is still relevant today

It has long outlived it’s purpose, but it’s being kept alive out of laziness…

— Ram Gopal Varma (@RGVzoomin) January 9, 2026

“Censorship doesn’t prevent exposure; it only insults the viewers,” he said, noting that society consumes graphic material on social media but objects in theatres.

At a press interaction held after ‘Parasakthi’ obtained the certificate on January 9, actor Sivakarthikeyan said he was dismayed when both ‘Jana Nayagan’ and his film ran into certification hurdles.

Agreeing that the Censor Board has its own set of rules, regulations and criteria, Sivakarthikeyan said, nevertheless, the release uncertainties hurt producers, theatres and workers across the value chain.

According to him, controversies around the censor decisions should not be allowed to derail months of planning.

On the changes that were implemented in ‘Parasakthi’ to get the certificate, the actor said it was a challenge to implement those changes without affecting the film’s core.

“We didn’t have time to get into why they suggested these changes and so on. The changes came only in the afternoon, after which we had to implement them and load the film on CUBE,” he said.

Meanwhile, in a video post, Venkat K Narayana of KVN Productions, which is backing ‘Jana Nayagan’, detailed how an initial clearance was overturned on a complaint, sparking a Madras High Court order for certification that now faces a stay.

He said the film was submitted to the CBFC on December 18, 2025 and that the examining committee recommended a UA 16+ certificate on December 22, subject to certain cuts and modifications that the team accepted and implemented.

He said that days before the scheduled January 9 release, the producers were informed the film had been referred to a revising committee based on a complaint, prompting them to move the Madras High Court, which later questioned the reopening of a concluded certification process and directed the CBFC to grant clearance.