Vignesh Shivan compares Vijay's Jana Nayagan leak to death: ‘My condolences’

Days after Vijay's final film Jana Nayagan was leaked online, Vignesh Shivan compares it to death at an event for Love Insurance Kompany.

Filmmaker Vignesh Shivan’s latest film Love Insurance Kompany (LIK), starring Pradeep Ranganathan, Krithi Shetty, and SJ Suryah, was released in theatres on Friday. On Wednesday, the film’s team held an event to speak about the film’s success. At the event, Vignesh spoke about the leak of Vijay’s unreleased film Jana Nayagan and compared it to death.

At an event for Love Insurance Kompany, Vignesh Shivan spoke about the Jana Nayagan leak.

Vignesh Shivan pays condolences to H Vinoth

Vignesh seemed disturbed by the state of affairs in the Tamil film industry when he said at the LIK event, “Every day, a film is getting dropped in Kollywood, and directors are being replaced. Today, the situation of directors is very worrisome. I won’t take names…okay, even if I do, let me tell them. A huge film has been leaked online. In this case, I would like to express my condolences to my friend, H Vinoth.”

Explaining why a director would feel the pain of the leak over anyone else, he added, “Because this is as painful as death. Only as a director can you feel that. Every single day, every single shot, I can feel how much the director has struggled. I can feel that pain as a director. When nothing goes as expected, it’s very difficult.” Jana Nayagan was leaked online in HD print on April 9, and six arrests have been made in the case since.

Explains difference between love and piracy

This comes after Vignesh also spoke about this on Behindwoods’ Straight From Hearts show. He claimed that he knocked the phone out of a person’s hand when he spotted them watching the pirated Jana Nayagan on the way to Madurai airport. He mentioned that it hurts to see hard work being treated like that. When the interviewer mentioned that Vignesh had shared a scene of his own film LIK that a fan posted on Instagram stories, he explained the difference.

“One minute to ten minutes, ten minutes to fifteen minutes, like that, some people upload the whole movie on their Instagram Stories. When Suryah sir danced to the famous song Mayiliragae (in LIK), he was initially hesitant to do so. But the theatre enjoyed it a lot, and someone uploaded it. I wanted to reshare it. So, there’s a difference between piracy and love. That was not piracy, it’s love,” he said, laughing.

Jana Nayagan, which also stars Mamitha Baiju, Bobby Deol and Pooja Hegde, was supposed to be released in theatres in January. However, it was postponed due to a delay in the CBFC's certification. Four months later, a new release date has yet to be announced.