VIJAYAWADA: Several top heroes and directors from the Tollywood are likely to meet chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy at his Tadepalli camp office on Thursday.
Though it was initially said that actors Chiranjeevi and Nagarjuna would meet the chief minister, sources say other heroes including Mahesh Babu, Prabhas and Junior NTR, and directors Rajamouli and Trivikram Srinivas are also joining the team. Producer, director and actor R Narayana Murthy will also be part of the team meeting the chief minister. The delegation would meet chief minister at 3 pm, sources say.
Minister for cinematography Perni Venkatramaiah had already held a meeting with the chief minister to prepare the agenda and the government’s stand on the key issues that are expected to come for discussion in the meeting with the Tollywood representatives. The core issues included the theatre prices, online booking of tickets and benefit shows.
The state government had put restrictions on benefit shows which have been exploiting the movie-goers with the theatres charging high price on each ticket, which goes beyond 5,000. It was also noticed by the government that at least two benefit shows are screened in some select theatres whenever a big budget film is released. In such cases, the government gets nothing in the form of tax as the entire money collected goes to the exhibitor, distributor, producer and the hero.
Similarly, the theatres are charging higher amounts from the film goers on new releases against the tax to be paid to the government. Some theatres also have extra chairs for the big releases, which are also not taxed and paid to the government. The state government had decided to go for online booking of tickets and fixed the ticket prices based on the category of the town or city and the theatre.
These are the issues which are contentious forcing the Tollywood representatives to hold talks with the government. Talks were earlier held between the industry representatives and the minister for cinematography, followed by Chiranjeevi meeting the chief minister in the first half of January. This would be the second meeting of Chiranjeevi with the Tollywood team, where a compromise is expected to be worked out to benefit both sides.
