‘Jana Nayakan’ censor row: Supreme Court to hear producer’s plea on January 15

The Supreme Court will hear the petition filed by the producer of the Tamil film starring Vijay on January 15, 2026.Jan NayganChallenging an interim order of the Madras High Court which had stayed a single-judge direction granting CBFC clearance to the film.

The tentative date of hearing, which was earlier listed as January 19, 2026, was revised on Tuesday (January 13, 2026) evening.

As per the cause list of the Supreme Court, this case will be listed before the bench of Chief Justice of India Surya Kant.

The film’s producer, KVN Productions LLP, filed an appeal against the order passed by a division bench of the High Court on January 12, 2026, which had stayed the single judge’s direction to the Central Board of Film Certification to immediately issue a certificate to the film.

Jan NayganWhich was widely promoted as Mr. Vijay’s final film before his full entry into politics, was scheduled for a Pongal release on January 9, 2026.

However, the film ran into hurdles at the last minute after the CBFC did not issue the certification on time.

The division bench order came hours after Justice PT Asha directed the CBFC to grant the approval on January 9, 2026. Jan NayganCanceled the Film Board’s direction to refer the matter to the review committee.

The first bench of Chief Justice MM Srivastava and G Arul Murugan granted an interim stay against the single judge’s decision on the appeal filed by CBFC.

Earlier, while admitting KVN Productions’ plea seeking direction to the CBFC to issue the censor certificate, Justice Asha had said that once the board decided to grant the certificate, the Chairman had no power to refer the matter to a review committee.

The film board immediately filed an appeal against the order.

Additional Solicitor-General ARL Sundaresan and Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta, who appeared through video conferencing, outlined the grounds for the appeal before the division bench.

The CBFC’s letter dated January 6, 2026, which informed the film’s producer that the matter had been referred to the review committee, was not at all subject to challenge. But the single judge rejected the letter and gave the above direction.

The division bench, in its order, said that the petition was filed on January 6, 2026 and CBFC was not given adequate opportunity to file its reply.

The division bench said the stay will remain and ordered notice to be served on the film’s producer and posted the matter to January 21, 2026.