[3] He made his directorial debut with Ganesh (1998), a Telugu language action film starring Venkatesh, which went on to win five Nandi Awards.

Thirupathiswamy made Azad, another successful Telugu action film, starring Nagarjuna, Soundarya and Shilpa Shetty in 2000 and won positive reviews for his work.

He was then signed up to direct a Tamil film, Narasimha, after director N. Maharajan had opted out of making the Vijayakanth-starrer.

[9] Actor Srikanth's character in the film Sadhurangam (2011) was named after Thirupathisamy, who was the director Karu Pazhaniappan's close friend.

[10] Similarly, AR Murugadoss noted that the story of his production Engaeyum Eppothum (2011) reminded him of the tragic incident of Thirupathisamy's death.