MUMBAI, Dec 29:
As productions halted, theatres shut their doors and audiences settled down in front of their screens, the Hindi film industry hit pause button in the year that was – resulting in revenue losses of maybe thousands of crores and many thousands of workers forced into unemployment.
The coronavirus pandemic scripted a tale of unprecedented challenges for the flourishing industry that came to a screeching halt in 2020.
While there are no exact figures, some insiders estimated the losses could be upwards of Rs 1,500 crore to “thousands of crores” and said single screen theatres would have lost anything between Rs 25 to Rs 75 lakh a month.
According to trade analyst Amul Mohan, for instance, about 200 Hindi films are made in a year and Bollywood’s yearly box office earnings stand at a little over Rs 3,000 crore.
“It has been a different and difficult year. Things have not gone as per plan,” Mohan said.
It is a dual edged crisis, of creating content and also exhibiting it with many producers either postponing or moving to OTT platforms. Though theatres in several parts of the country have opened after nine months – they closed in March when India went into lockdown to ward off COVID-19 — people are still fearful of watching a movie in an enclosed space. To compound the problem, there are no new films to lure them in.
It spells catastrophe for an industry that supports lakhs of people. About five lakh people, including actors, directors and producers, are registered with the Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE). Of these, 2.5 lakh are ‘workers’, including junior artistes, makeup, set designers, carpenters and background dancers, said FWICE president B N Tiwari,
Trade observer Himesh Mankad said the losses could carry over next year.
“On a yearly basis, total Hindi films earnings would have been about Rs 3,000 crore but they stand at Rs 500-600 crore only. So we have lost out on making at least Rs 1,700-2,000 crore. It is a notional loss since 2020 films will release in 2021. “(But) there will be interest costs, overhead costs, because of which each film’s budget could go up by Rs 5 crore-15 crore. This can be called added expenditure,” Mankad said.
The ripple effect will be felt for a while, he said.
“Films will face competition week-by-week and their run will be cut short. Besides, the pandemic is still here so occupancy won’t reach 100 per cent in cinema halls. The fear psychosis will persist till we get a vaccine,” Mankad said. Raj Bansal, senior distributor and exhibitor, echoed his pessimism. The year 2020 was the worst ever, said Bansal, who has been in the distribution business for almost six decades and is director of Entertainment Paradise, a three-screen multiplex in Jaipur.
“In Rajasthan, theatres are still closed. They may reopen in January. The situation is likely to improve only when big films are released in theatres as they can bring the audiences in. It’s difficult to put a number to the losses that we have faced. The losses are in huge numbers,” Bansal said.
Akshay Rathi, who has cinema houses in Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, said 2020 has tested all the players in the entertainment industry. Both Rathi and Bansal said it is the first time in the history of cinema that theatres remained shut for so many months. “Losses go into thousands of crores as there have been overheads on cinemas, cost of interest on films, holding costs, and other things. Each single screen theatre would have lost anything between Rs 25-75 lakh per month because they have electricity and maintenance bills, salaries to pay and a lot of things to look after with no income,” Rathi said. (PTI)
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