The Telangana High Court has directed Telangana Home Department Principal Secretary Shikha Goel to reconsider and withdraw the September 20 memo that permitted ticket price hikes for Nani’s The Paradise. The court found that the permission appeared to be contrary to the conditions laid down in the state government’s latest guidelines on movie ticket prices.
The matter came up before a bench headed by Justice N.V. Shravan Kumar following a lunch motion petition filed by lawyer Vijay Gopal. The petition challenged the permission granted to The Paradise, which is scheduled to release on September 24. Under the memo, the film was allowed to hold premieres from 6:30 PM on September 23 with tickets priced at Rs 500.
During the hearing, the court pointed to G.O. 77 issued by the state government on August 14, particularly conditions 8, 9, 10 and 11. The new guidelines stipulate that films with a production budget exceeding Rs 100 crore can seek a ticket price hike subject to specified conditions, including depositing funds towards the welfare of film workers. The court questioned how the permission was granted to The Paradise without material being placed before it to show that these conditions had been fulfilled.
The bench also referred to its earlier directions that proposals seeking a ticket price hike should be placed in the public domain 90 days before a film’s release, allowing the public to submit objections. The court expressed concern that permissions were instead being issued shortly before releases, while challenges to such orders were being heard only after tickets had already gone on sale.
The court observed that this practice had continued for about a year and said that taking decisions on ticket hikes without giving the public an opportunity to raise objections was problematic. It also held that the Home Department’s latest memo appeared to have disregarded the earlier court directions. The court issued notices seeking an explanation from the Home Department and directed the Principal Secretary to reconsider the September 20 memo. The matter has been posted for further hearing on October 6.
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