It was no show as Sandalwood protests service tax

In a show of solidarity, the State’s filmdom, cutting across their sectoral callings, downed the shutters on various film activities to protest against the Centre’s proposed move to levy 10.30 per cent service tax on the film industry.

With Gandhinagar — the hub of Sandalwood film activities, and its constituents across the City and State – marking their strong disapproval of the Centre’s proposal by not screening any films at over 800 theatres, Thursday turned out into a ‘No Show’ day for many of the regular cinegoers at least at the single screen theatres.

However, with Friday promising a veritable line-up of latest movies to binge upon, the day did not disappoint the regulars much, who did not mind making do with visiting the malls and multiplexes, a change from their routine.

But for the exhibitors at the single theatres, the day turned out into one of loss of business around Rs 40 crore, according to the Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce (KFCC). It is hoped that Thursday’s loss would be more than made up on Friday and most of them would recover their lost revenue.

The day, which saw members of KFCC comprising actors, actresses, directors, producers and other film technicians, in contingent staging a protest march from Sheshadri Road till Raj Bhavan culminated in the handing over of a memorandum to governor H R Bhardwaj. Incidentally, the nation-wide protest was called by the Film Federation of Indian and various other film organisations across the country.

According to KFCC President K V Chandrashekar the 10.30 per cent service tax proposed by the Centre would put huge burden on the Kannada film industry, which is already struggling to make ends meet.

While the financial status of Kannada film industry is universally known, the Centre’s introduction of service tax on the total collection of the industry will not only add to the existing burden but also drive the final nail in the coffin of surviving theatres which are fighting a losing battle in the absence of a concerned policy prescriptive from the State government, said Chandrashekar.

Stating that despite exhorting the Centre to withdraw the proposed tax, their call has not been heeded as on date, Chandrashekar observed that “we will wait till the Union Budget to see if the Centre rolls back the proposal. If not we (the entire industry) may have to chalk out our next course of action,” to ensure the industry is not given a short shrift.

Among the galaxy of stars and film personalities who participated included Ambarish, Ravichandran, Shivarajkumar, Jaggesh, Raghavendra Rajkumar, Puneeth Rajkumar, Sudeep, Tara, Bhavana, Shruthi, Yash, Directors’ association president M S Ramesh, Producers’ association president Munirathra, Karnataka Chalanachitra Academy President T S Nagabharana, Producer Sa Ra Govindu and Director S Narayan.  Some the prominent absentees were Darshan, Ganesh, Upendra, Ramya, Harshika Poonacha, Diganth, Aindrita Ray and Ragini.

Besides some of the multiplexes in the City, most single screen theatres were shut. However some theatres resumed shows by evening.