Restaurants, pubs and bars in Bengaluru are resigned to lukewarm business on New Year’s Eve, following the Karnataka government’s decision to ban DJ parties and dance events. It has also reduced occupancy by half from December 30 to January 2.
The period from Christmas till New Year’s Eve is peak business time for restaurants, pubs, and hotels.
Many had, however, anticipated such guidelines given the Omicron scare and prepared accordingly.
A five-star hotel on Vittal Mallya Road had made two plans to beat the last-minute chaos. Sidharth Koul, director, sales and marketing, says, “Plan A was to host a DJ party as we used to do pre-pandemic. Plan B was to focus on dining with a small element of entertainment like live music featuring a vocalist. We are going with Plan B.”
Ravisha Y K’s events company had declined an offer to host an NYE party at an F&B venue. “The Christmas-New Year’s Eve season fetches us what we make in three months but we saw this rule coming,” he says.
The guidelines for the CBD area are always stricter, so a prominent outlet did not plan festivities. “Last year, we were asked to shut down by 9 pm. So December 31 is not our prime business day,” says general manager Om Prakash.
On the other hand, a pub in Koramangala was caught by surprise. It had already sold 60 tickets for its ‘Boom Bolly NYE 2022’ party featuring DJ Manz from Pune. “We had to cancel everything — flight tickets for the DJ, fireworks display and dhol performers,” says general manager Mohith Gowda. Now the team is focusing on dining and will give priority to those who have purchased tickets.
A venue for luxury residences on Vittal Mallya Road had to cancel a private party to be headlined by DJ Amit. Those guests have booked rooms to ring in the new year. “Now we will promote our festive menu on social media and encourage dining across our restaurants and cafe and play recorded music instead,” says general manager Wajeed Bagwan.
Chetan Hegde, owner of a chain of pubs, called off a party scheduled at his JP Nagar branch. Given “the uncertainty around the events business right now”, it was better to be safe than sorry, he felt.
He is, however, relieved that pubs and bars have not been ordered to shut down, like they were last year. “We have some room to work around. We will host a la carte dine-in and make pre-bookings mandatory to avoid overcrowding,” he says. A chain with three restaurants and a cloud kitchen in the city hopes its home delivery business will make up for the 50% cap on diners. “We are planning discounts and deals on online orders,” says its managing director Debaditya Chaudhury.
Let us play, say DJs
DJs in the city are planning to appeal to the Karnataka government to let them perform. “Our business has been dull for over a year already,” says DJ Vipul Khurana, a regular on the NYE entertainment scene. “But we have no association or industry body backing us. We don’t know how to take our plea forward,” he adds.
The circular has axed DJ parties and makes no mention of other forms of music gigs such as live bands, which the community finds discriminatory. “DJs were hit hard when the pandemic peaked. The government offered monetary support to other artiste groups but not us. Now with these new restrictions, we are the first ones to be called out. It is unfair,” rues DJ Martin Dsouza.
Guidelines vague: apartment body
The guideline banning large gatherings in apartments is unclear, says Vikram Rai, general secretary of Bangalore Apartments’ Federation. “A ‘large’ gathering is one thing for an apartment complex with 20 houses and another for an apartment complex with 200 houses. So we will ask our apartment associations to keep the celebrations low-key,” he says. A gated community in Whitefield is now planning to just decorate the premises. An apartment association in Koramangala has sent an email to its residents to avoid house parties too.
Party is in the house
With pubs and bars calling off the NYE bashes, Bengalureans are taking the party home. “We were expecting some restrictions to come in. I am going to a farmhouse that one of my friends owns and 15 of us will party there on December 31,” says Saketh V, a 27-year-old entrepreneur. College student Simran Sodhi did not get lucky. “My friends and I tried booking farmhouses outside the city a week ago but they were already full. So it’s a house party for me I guess,” she says. Some are booking service apartments for private parties, some are heading to Goa for the year-end vacation, which coincides with the Sunburn Festival (December 27
to 29).
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