The Central Board of Film Certification has cleared Nitesh Tiwari’s Ramayana for release with a U certificate and, in a rare outcome for a film of this scale, asked for no cuts, no audio-visual modifications and no additional ticker conditions. The certificate was handed to the makers on October 30, less than a week before the film opens in cinemas.
What the certification says
The certified length is 195 minutes, or three hours and fifteen minutes. That makes Ramayana one of the longer Hindi theatrical releases this season, and the absence of any trimming means audiences will see the film essentially as submitted.
Bollywood Hungama reported exclusively that the CBFC’s examining committee did not require even routine changes such as carrying titles and credits in the film’s language or inserting an anti-drug message at the opening or interval.
How rare a U really is
A U certificate permits unrestricted public exhibition for all age groups. For a big-budget religious epic, that is a commercially meaningful classification: it makes the film a straightforward family outing and widens the addressable audience in a way a U/A 16+ rating would not.
Recent films that passed without cuts, including The Vvan and Drishyam The Conclusion, still received U/A 16+ ratings. Ramayana’s U clearance therefore stands out as much for the rating as for the absence of conditions.
The facts at a glance
- Certificate: U, universal viewing for all ages
- Cuts: none; no audio or visual modifications
- Conditions: no title or credit language change, no anti-drug ticker
- Runtime: 195 minutes, or 3 hours 15 minutes
- Release: less than a week away
Why it matters for the release
Ramayana stars Ranbir Kapoor as Lord Rama, Yash as Ravana, Sai Pallavi as Sita, Ravie Dubey as Lakshman and Sunny Deol as Lord Hanuman, with Namit Malhotra producing and Nitesh Tiwari directing. A clean U clearance removes one common pre-release uncertainty and signals that the film’s treatment of the source material did not require revision at the certification stage.
For Hindi cinema’s mythological and devotional titles, the certification decision is often watched as closely as the teaser. A U rating with no listed excisions is a signal that the makers have balanced spectacle with restraint, a balance that has not always been easy for films that depict sacred figures on screen.
For exhibitors, the 195-minute runtime has a practical consequence: fewer shows can be scheduled per screen each day. That raises the value of every show and puts more weight on advance booking, ticket pricing and the family audience the U certificate invites.
The next checkpoint is the opening-day audience response. A long, cleanly certified epic can play as an event film if families turn out in volume; if the length instead cools walk-ins, the programming math will dominate the box-office conversation.
Source: Bollywood Hungama
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