The four day-long strike announced by theatre owners in Tamil Nadu against the 30% local body tax levied by the State government has come to an end.
At the same time, however, movie tickets in Tamil Nadu, which are among the lowest in the country with an upper limit of ₹120, are going to become slightly more expensive.
From Friday onwards, cinema theatres will charge 28% as GST separately, over and above the price of the movie ticket. If the ticket is priced at ₹120, the film-goer will pay slightly more than ₹153. A GST of 18% will be charged for tickets priced at ₹100 or less.
Asked whether the State government has given them a favourable response on the local body tax pegged at 30%, Abirami Ramanthan, president, Tamil Nadu Theatre Owners and Distributors Association, said that the government had informed them that a committee will be set up to look into the issue.
Decision later
“We presented our point of view and the officials in the government were receptive to our problems. We hope that the issue will be resolved in our favour,” he said. As of now, no decision has been taken on the local body tax.
Cinema owners will face practical problems such as providing exact change to movie-goers who buy tickets from the counter using cash.
“A ₹ 120 ticket will now cost ₹ 153.6 after adding GST and a ₹ 10 ticket will now cost ₹ 11.80. Similarly a ₹ 60 ticket will cost ₹ 70.8. While card transactions are not a problem, providing exact change will be a concern. We may have to forego the change,” said another cinema owner.
The makers of the two movies, Ivan Thanthiran and Vanamagan that were badly affected by the strike, came together and announced on Thursday evening after the strike was withdrawn that the films would re-release in theatres across the State from Friday.
While Ivan Thanthiran had released on June 30 and was in the theatres only for three days before the strike began, Vanamagan had released the week before.
“The exhibitors association of Tamil Nadu has promised me that they would give us the net collection for the first three days without taking the exhibitors’ share to compensate for the loss accrued due to the four-day shutdown.
“I am confident that they will honour their commitment. The movie took off very well in the first three days. I was expecting ₹ 2 crore this week, which I am losing,” said G Dhananjayan, who is distributing Ivan Thanthiran .
But the increase in taxes after GST came into force would have meant that he would have in any case lost a substantial amount of money even if the theatres had not shut, he said.
