As anticipated the audio release of Ram Gopal Varma's Shiva 2006, held at the Marriot Hotel in Hyderabad on 11th August, saw a high profile attendance what with most of the cast of the original Shiva, including chief guest Nagarjuna and Amala, turning up to lend their support. Both Nagarjuna and Amala, who were the lead actor of Shiva (1989) jointly released the audio cassette of Shiva 2006.

"I am meeting the cast of my Siva after a gap of 17 years" Chief Guest Nagarjuna said "I am really happy for Ram Gopal Varma and I am sure that he will create the same magic with this Siva as he did with the old one" .

Nagarjuna and Amala also gave away shields to the cast and crew of Shiva (1989) which included S. Gopal Reddy, Sirivennela Seetarama Sastry, Tanikella Bharani, Raghuvaran, Kota, Siva Nageswara Rao, Sathibabu, Bhanodaya, Mani, Chinna, Ram Jagan, G. Murali, Satyanarayana, Sushma, Uttej and others.

"Ram Gopla Varma told me to cut down on the humor when I showed him the first copy of dialogues I had written for Shiva in 1989" writer-actor Thanikella Bharani said "he said that the dialogues had be more serious. I had just then worked on the comedy movie Sri Kanakamahalakshmi Dance Troup and showing the same zeal wrote the dialogues for Shiva with a lot of humor injected into them".

Finally the man of the evening, Ram Gopal Varma, took to the mike "though many people give me the credit for making way for new directors to directly working on a film without assisting another director, the actual credit goes to Nagarjuna, who, despite me being a newcomer, showed immense faith in me and my story. He gave me complete freedom. At one point, though I was very clear with my story, because of the new technology we were using I would get confused at certain points". Speaking about the music by Illayaraja, Ram Gopal Varma said "We have used some of Illayaraja's old tunes and modified them according to the situations. But the song 'Botany class' was used as it is as that song is the signature song of Shiva".

Other celebrities who graced the occasion were ANR, Venkatesh, Ravi Teja, Sumanth and Nithin. Puri Jagannadh, B. Gopal, Rasool Ellore, Chandra Siddartha and Ramana.