Navarasa Nayaka Jaggesh to not celebrate his birthday on March 17 out of respect to the late Puneeth Rajkumar

March 17 was a happy day not only in the Rajkumar household, but in Navarasa Nayaka Jaggesh’s too. Jaggesh and Puneeth Rajkumar share birthdays on March 17. This year, though, Jaggesh will not celebrate his big day, as he turns 59, out of respect for the late Power Star who passed away tragically, aged only 46, in October last year.

Along with his last photo with the late Power Star, Jaggesh tweeted, “I will not celebrate my birthday this year as I turn 59; I am not in the right frame of mind for celebration. The reason being that I will never again get a call from Puneeth Rajkumar wishing me on my birthday, “Anna, happy birthday”; something he did without fail every year.” In fact, Puneeth has often conveyed his wishes to Jaggesh in public too, declaring that he’s a big fan of the latter. Fans, of course, were highly appreciative of Jaggesh’s decision, considering that they are looking at making Puneeth’s birthday this time a major event with the release of his last commercial film.

Produced by Kishore Pathikonda and directed by Chethan Kumar (of Bahaddur, Bharjari and Bharaate fame), James is releasing in theatres on March 17 in Kannada, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam. The film has music by MR Charanraj, cinematography by Swamy J Gowda, and has a massive ensemble cast on board, including Priya Anand, Anu Prabhakar Mukherjee, Srikanth, Sarath Kumar, John Kokken, Tilak Shekar, Aditya Menon, Mukesh Rishi, Shine Shetty, Chikkanna, Sadhu Kokila, Rangayana Raghu, Suchendra Prasad and Avinash among others. The film also features cameos by Century Star Shivarajkumar and Raghavendra Rajkumar, making it to the only movie with the three Rajkumar siblings.