Jana Nayagan Movie Leak | Chennai Court Rejects Bail To Nine Accused, Says Investigation Necessary To Unearth Entire Network Of Conspiracy

Judge S Karthikeyan dismissed the bail petitions filed by Srinath @ Sriram, Sanjay, Bala @ Balakrishnan, Manigandan, Ruthran, Rajesh, Prasanth, Selvam, and Rajini.

“From the submissions of the learned CPP, it is found that the investigation is in its initial stage. A deep and thorough investigation is required in this case to unearth the entire network of the conspiracy hatched in this case. Considering the above serious allegations and the current stage of investigation, this court is not inclined to grant bail to the petitioners,” the court said.

As per the prosecution case, the petitioners, who were freelance editors working with Mr Pradeep, the editor of the movie had illegally stolen the digital files of the movie from a hard disk kept at the studio and shared the same with their friend, Uma Shankar who had then circulated the said movie to several persons and ultimately leaked it on social media. It may be noted that the anticipatory bail petition of said Uma Shankar was dismissed by the Madras High Court.

The accused persons submitted that the movie was copied in a Google drive and forwarded to many persons and they were among the ones who received the same. The accused argued that they were not responsible for stealing the movie or releasing the same in social media and thus sought for bail.

On the other hand, the prosecution submitted that the theatrical value, satellite value, OTT rights, overseas distribution rights, and overall market value of the film would suffer due to the illegal leak of the movie and it has directly caused severe financial loss of the movie makers.

The prosecution also submitted that during the investigation, it was found that a Google link titled Janayaan Film Video was uploaded by one of the accused. It was also found that the accused were involved in uploading an unlicensed/unauthorised, watermarked video on WhatsApp, Instagram, Telegram, YouTube, Facebook, and other social media links and spreading the video through multiple social media platforms, thereby causing huge financial loss to the production company and the Director.

The court noted that, though the accused maintained that they were only receivers of the Google Drive link and had nothing to do with the release of the film, as per the prosecution, they were actively involved in releasing the movie online with the intention of earning huge profits from viewers.

Thus, considering the materials, the court was not inclined to grant them bail and dismissed the plea.

Case Title: Srinath @ Sriram v. State

Case No: Crl.M.P.Nos.3737, 3759, 3776, 3915/2026