Actor Vikram termed recent incidents of crime against women as disgusting in a recent interview with PTI. While promoting his recent film Thangalaan, which is releasing in Hindi on August 30, the actor said, "All women need to feel protected. They should be able to walk the streets at 3.00 in the morning and feel they can walk, go home, and that nobody will do anything. That every man is there to protect them, to give them their space. It's disgusting what's happening."

Vikram's statements come on the brink of the rape and murder of a female doctor in Kolkata, and the Justice Hema Committee report on women's exploitation in Malayalam cinema. “We get affected by most things that happen. I've always thought that if I were creative, would I address it more in my movies? Will I do something?” he said.

The actor continued, "It's something that I'm trying to figure out, ‘What do we do? What does the nation need to do? Do we start young? Do we start inculcating these things in children?' As Pa Ranjith says, ‘Change the whole system and start from scratch'. I don't know; something has to be done."