The Madras High Court on Monday directed Government Pleader T.N. Rajagopalan to obtain instructions from the State government by Friday as to whether it had issued any executive orders fixing a cap on prices charged by multiplexes and other cinemas in the State.
Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice Abdul Quddhose issued the direction on a writ petition filed by activist G. Devarajan last year for initiating action against as many as 40 cinemas, which according to him, were known for selling tickets at exorbitant charges for movies starring popular actors.
During the course of arguments, the Chief Justice said multiplexes in Kolkata were following the practice as alleged by the writ petitioner. They were charging huge amounts during the initial days of big releases. She wanted to know if the Tamil Nadu government had taken any action against theatres here.
The writ petition was filed in October 2017 just days before the release of Vijay-starrer Mersal. Though writ petitions were generally heard and disposed of by single judges of the High Court, Justice K. Ravichandrabaabu referred this petition to a Division Bench since it was in the nature of a PIL petition.
Amassing money
In his affidavit, the petitioner claimed that select theatres in the State were in the habit of making a huge amount of money during the first five days of big releases involving celebrated actors. He claimed to have already filed many writ petitions related to exorbitant ticket charges collected by theatres.
He pointed out that four writ petitions filed by him with respect to charging beyond government-fixed prices for Rajinikanth-starrer Kabali, Suriya-starrer Singam III, Vijay’s Bairava and actor Ajith’s Vivegam were pending in the court after the filing of counter affidavits by the officials (respondents). “I beg to submit that the theatre owners in Tamil Nadu totally ignore the laws, and with the sole intention of amassing profits, have looted crores of rupees illegally when the films featuring popular stars are screened,” the petitioner said and apprehended that there was every possibility of collection of excess ticket rates for Mersal.
Accusing special teams formed by the government, on a direction issued by the court in one of the cases filed by him, of not functioning actively, he sought a direction to the teams to conduct day-to-day inspection at cinemas to keep a check on overpricing of tickets and impose a penalty of ₹ 1 lakh on violators.
He urged the court to direct all cinemas in the State to exhibit the government-fixed ticket rates on their notice boards.
