Actor Dhanush took to social media on Tuesday, August 31 to share a photo of him along with rapper Arivu and playback singer Dhee. Sharing the photo which was taken at popular music composer Yuvan Shankar Raja’s birthday bash on Tuesday, Dhanush addressed Dhee and Arivu as ‘Enjaamis’, referring to the duo’s hit independent single ‘Enjoy Enjaami’. “With Enjaami’s .. A billion and a half picture!!(sic),” Dhanush’s caption reads. In addition, the photo was re-tweeted by music composer Santhosh Narayanan, who noted that the photo was clicked by him.
Dhanush’s latest photo comes days after the controversy around Rolling Stone India's August 2021 cover featuring ‘Enjoy Enjaami’ singer Dhee and ‘Neeye Oli’ singer Shan Vincent de Paul. Although speculations and discussions about Arivu’s exclusion from Rolling Stone India’s cover led to a heated debate on social media, an official statement from Dhee, Santhosh Narayanan and Arivu is yet to be issued.
On August 22, director Pa Ranjith posted a tweet condemning Rolling Stone India magazine’s cover that featured 'Enjoy Enjaami’ singer Dhee and Shan Vincent de Paul, who wrote and performed the English rap segment of ‘Neeye Oli’, the title track of Ranjith’s recent sports film Sarpatta Parambarai. Both the tracks were released by AR Rahman’s independent music collective maajja. In his tweet, Ranjith questioned why Arivu, who wrote and performed ‘Enjoy Enjaami’ and co-wrote ‘Neeye Oli’, was not featured on the cover. “@TherukuralArivu, the lyricist of #Neeyaoli and singer as well as lyricist of #enjoyenjami has once again been invisiblised. @
Ranjith’s tweet led to several social media users questioning whether Arivu, who belongs to a Dalit community and who is known for his strong anti-caste lyrics, was being deliberately invisibilised. Social media posts about Arivu’s erasure were widely circulated since the Rolling Stone cover was not the first time that the debate has come up. Though he had written the lyrics of ‘Enjoy Enjaami’, Arivu's photo was not featured on the Times Square billboard for the remix version that was done by French producer DJ Snake along with singer Dhee. He, was, however, credited for the lyrics on the billboard.
Singer Shan Vincent de Paul responded to Ranjith’s tweet with a rap, though the director's tweet was not addressed to him. Meanwhile, in the aftermath of the severe backlash, Rolling Stone India released a digital cover featuring Arivu for August 2021. It described Arivu as a wordsmith, composer and rapper and also stated that “the Tamil artist has scorched a path out, raising his voice against systemic injustices.”