Nivin Pauly slams Kerala Film Producers Association for revealing box office numbers, says there's ‘no need’

While promoting his upcoming film Sarvam Maya, Nivin Pauly spoke about the producers' council saying 2025 only had 15 hits this year. 

Malayalam actor Nivin Pauly has questioned the need for releasing a list detailing the box office performances of Malayalam films. While promoting his recently released film Sarvam Maya, the actor spoke to the press about the Kerala Film Producers Association, claiming that only 15 films in the language were hits this year.

Nivin Pauly slams producers' council

Nivin spoke at the press conference about how, like every business, the film industry also goes through ups and downs. Stating that there was ‘no need’ to make such a list public, he said, “Every business has its ups and downs, profit and loss. There is no need to make a list like this public. Something like this has not been done before.”

He also argued that such disclosures will hinder future investment in Malayalam cinema, making it harder to fund more films. The actor also recently faced a setback in his career, with an unsuccessful run at the box office, although some of his films were critically acclaimed.

Kerala Film Producers’ Association’s claim

The Kerala Film Producers’ Association released a list publicly, highlighting the films they claim have performed well at the box office. Out of 184 films released in 2025, the association claims that only 15 films did well at the box office. They claimed that nine of the films were ‘superhits’ while the rest were just ‘hits’.

Films like Thudarum, Lokah: Chapter 1 – Chandra, L2 Empuraan, Diés Iraé, Hridayapoorvam, Kalamkaval and more made the list of superhits. Films like Eko, Pet Detective and Bromance were termed as just hits. The association also blamed the government for a lack of support, threatening to boycott government-run theatres starting next month.

Filmmaker Anuraj Manohar, whose film Narivetta starred Tovino Thomas and was one of the most-talked-about Malayalam hits this year, questioned why his project did not appear in the list and challenged the association.