The Madras High Court has ruled in favour of Jana Nayagan, directing the CBFC to immediately grant a U/A 16 certificate. The court noted that the filmmakers had already complied with all suggested cuts
Still from Jana Nayagan
A little late in the day, but the Madras High Court has passed its judgment in favour of the makers of Jana Nayagan. The makers of Thalapathy Vijay's final film had gone to court against the CBFC after they were referred to the revision committee for certification. On Friday morning, the Madras HC bench hearing the matter ordered CBFC to promptly grant censor clearance for the release of the Tamil film.
A win for Jana Nayagan
The verdict was annoucned by Justice PT Asha. The Court today has ordered the CBFC to forthwith grant the U/A 16 certificate, since the filmmakers have already complied with the earlier suggested cuts.
On January 7, the HC had reserved its order on a petition seeking a direction to the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) to give a censor certificate under 'UA 16+' category to the much-anticipated film.
On January 6, when the plea came up for hearing, Justice P T Asha had orally asked the CBFC to produce on January 7, a copy of the "complaint" that claimed the film "hurts religious sentiments."
The filmmakers had submitted that the movie had been referred for "review" after an initial recommendation for U/A certification. Even though the release date for Vijay's film had been fixed as January 9, it can only proceed legally, the Censor Board had told the court.
When the matter was first heard on January 6, the film's producer questioned how a complaint could be made about the film's contents when no member of the general public had watched the film yet.
In the ensuing hearing, however, it was revealed that the complaint was actually made by a member of the examining committee who claimed that his concerns were not recorded.
Representing the film's production house, Senior Advocate Satish Parasaran questioned how the filmmakers could be kept in the dark about this. He argued that the law demands that the CBFC act in a more transparent manner. He added that Rs 500 crores was riding on the film, while accusing the CBFC of dealing with the producer's concerns lightly.
The censor timeline
Directed by H Vinoth, the film 'Jana Nayagan' stars actors Vijay, Prakash Raj, Pooja Hegde, Mamitha Baiju, among others. The film team, having completed all work, sent it for censorship on December 18. Subsequently, on December 19, the censor board that viewed the film reportedly advised the removal of some scenes and muting of some dialogues. Even after changes suggested by the censor board members were made, the censor certificate has still not been issued, the petitioner movie production house had submitted.
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