Cinemas must stop fleecing movie-goers

Maharashtra food and civil supplies minister Ravindra Chavan’s statement in that state’s legislative council that multiplex cinemas would face stringent action if they prohibited people from carrying their own food into the cinema, has set the cat among the pigeons. It is an issue that resonates across the country, including Karnataka, as people going to multiplexes to watch movies have been fleeced for years, even as the government turned a blind eye to it. But Karnataka’s own civil supplies minister Zameer Ahmed said pretty much the same thing as Chavan last week, in the backdrop of a Public Interest Litigation in the Bombay High Court, questioning the policy of multiplexes forcing patrons to buy food, water and beverages sold only within their premises at exorbitant rates. The court is yet to pronounce its judgement, but it has already demolished one argument – security – that multiplexes have put forth: that if the multiplexes wanted to prevent people from carrying dangerous articles in the guise of food boxes, there were already adequate safety measures in the form of frisking and metal detectors to do that.

The fact of the matter is, owners of multiplexes exploit movie-goers not only with ever increasing admission rates, but during the time they spend in the cinemas also squeeze them with sky-high prices on food and beverages. The input cost of a bucket of popcorn may be no more than Rs 25, but inside multiplexes, they are sold at Rs 250 or more; a bottle of water may have a maximum retail price of Rs15, but it is sold at Rs 100 or more. It is unvarnished greed on display. According to available figures, which tell their own story, in nine months last year, a popular chain of multiplexes earned Rs 852 crore from box office collections and made another Rs 422 crore from the sale of food and beverages. The litigant in the case has made a pertinent point, that by preventing people from bringing food and forcing them to opt for mostly junk food of limited choice, the multiplexes’ policy also severely affects diabetic patients from having their diet food and boiled water at specific intervals.

The theatre owners’ contention that they run private businesses and therefore the government should not interfere holds no water as it involves people and their rights. Multiplexes are free to specify the snacks or food items that would be allowed inside cinemas and designate places where they can be consumed in the interest of maintaining cleanliness and order during the screening of movies. What they cannot be allowed to do is to continue to loot movie-goers. The government must step in and stop it.