Forget Doordarshan's soporific mediocrity. Forget the surfeit of satellite television invading our homes with songs and soap. Going to the movies is alive and kicking in India.
Problem is that there aren't enough screens around. A unesco study reveals there are only 12,900 screens in India, while desi cinefans require 20,000 screens to satiate their needs. Here 100 million people go to the movies every week.
Forget the stuffy, dank halls with motheaten seats. Movie-watching better be an experience these days. More and more people in Indian cities are willing to shell out over a hundred rupees to munch on popcorn and get drunk on cola, recline in a plush seat and stare at the big screen in nicely airconditioned environs.
The cineplex has stepped in to fulfil this growing aspiration. First off the mark was the Priya Village Roadshow (pvr), an Indo-Australian joint venture that revamped Delhi's Anupam theatre into a four-screen cineplex three years ago. Now, India has two branded multiplexes in Delhi and Ahmedabad.
Now they are also being planned in Pune, Baroda, Indore and Ahmedabad. Maharastra with its attractive tax sops is bound to bag a bounty. Multiplexes in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (mmr) will get 100 per cent tax exemption for four years with other infrastructure props, while in the rest of the state it will be for one more. And that's enough to lure entrepreneurs. New theatres are coming up and seedy old theatres are being turned into sleek cineplexes.
Mumbai-based E-Citi Entertainment is planning 50 multiplexes all over the country in the next two years, according to its president and ceo Sanjay Das. Land has been finalised in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Delhi, Lucknow, Chandigarh, Baroda, Bangalore and Agra. Mumbai itself will have two such complexes, one in Chembur and the other in Andheri. These will have shops, movies and other entertainment.
Says Das: "The space allotted to retail in my project will be less. The multiplex retail space ratio at Chembur will be 50:50 while at Andheri it will be 50:30." Although the extent of investment swings from Rs 25 crore to Rs 40 crore, the aim will remain universal: attract footfalls through multiplexes and benefit the retail space.
A clutch of producers, actors and realtors are also planning to start cineplexes. Among them are Shravan Shroff of Sringar films, filmstar Rishi Kapoor, producers Vashu Bhagnani and Bharat Shah. Aerens group and Tanejas are also exploring similar possibilities. "We are looking at 10 to 12 metros to build and operate multiplex theatres in. They will have between 8 to 16 screens in each theatre and will require Rs 20-30 crore in investment," informs Rajiv Sahai, ceo of Modi Entertainment.
Top Reliance sources admitted that one of the group companies had bid for a multiplex plot at the Bandra-Kurla complex. But while concluding they kept things open-ended saying, "Having put all our money into asset-based business now if we want to explore new terrains, we see nothing wrong in that."
Now, including a multiplex in a mall as a magnet is a global formula to woo more visitors and developers are aping the trend.
But what remains more interesting is the retail congestion that's taking place around theatres that are getting a multiplex facelift. "It's more like an outdoor mall around a high-traffic magnet," says a real estate consultant from Colliers Jardine.
"It's the quality services that attract the plush demographic segment to the multiplex and following them the retailers throng an area," says pvr's Ajjay Bijli who still considers malls a safer proposition but is open to stand-alone ventures.
