Chennai, Jun 13 (IANS): The release of director Hari's eagerly-awaited Tamil action entertainer 'Yaanai', featuring Arun Vijay and Priya Bhavani Shankar in the lead, has been pushed to July 1.

Confirming the decision to postpone the release of his film from June 17 to July 1, actor Arun Vijay, on his Instagram page, said, "With all due respect to 'Vikram', we are postponing our 'Yaanai' worldwide release to July 1st. Wishing Kamal Haasan sir and Lokesh Kanagaraj and RKFI for the record breaking success - Team Yaanai."

Sources say that the film's release has had to be postponed as director Lokesh Kanakaraj's 'Vikram' continues its strong run and theatre owners are reluctant to pull it off their their theatres.

As a result, 'Yaanai', which was to release along with 'Veetla Vishesham', the Tamil remake of the Hindi hit film 'Badhaai Ho', on June 17 has pulled out of the release race for next week.

This isn't the first time that the film's release is getting postponed. The film was to release on May 6 this year. However, it got postponed to June 17 and now, the release has been pushed to July 1.

The satellite and digital rights of the film have already been bought by the Zee group.

Produced by Drumstick Productions, the film features actress Priya Bhavani Shankar as its female lead, and is primarily targeted at 'B' and 'C' centre audiences.

The film has raised expectations as this is the first rural script that Arun Vijay is doing after a gap of almost 12 years.