Film industry welcomes FM’s ‘single-window clearance’ for filmmakers

MUMBAI: Interim finance minister Piyush Goyal on Friday extended the single-window clearance mechanism to Indian film producers, meeting a long long-standing demand of the industry. The mechanism was until now available only to foreign film producers while Indian filmmakers had to obtain multiple permissions from central and state governments to shoot at Indian locations.“This facility was earlier available only to foreigners but will now be made available to Indian filmmakers as well,” Goyal said in his budget speech.The Indian film industry had been asking for a mechanism for faster clearances as the earlier system was time consuming and led to increased costs.While various governments made announcements and lent a sympathetic ear to the industry, nothing much changed on the ground.“We are delighted that the immense contribution of Indian cinema towards employment generation in the country has been acknowledged and applauded in Parliament during the presentation of the Union Budget,” said Siddharth Roy Kapur, president of Producers Guild of India. "It has the potential to play a huge role in boosting tourism in the country too.”Last month while inaugurating the National Museum of Indian Cinema in Mumbai, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced that his government was working on a single-window clearance system to grant required permissions to Indian filmmakers.Sudhanshu Vats, Group CEO and MD, Viacom18, said, “FM has provided a tremendous fillip to the Indian Entertainment industry with the provision of single window clearance for films, in the Union Budget 2019. Such policy provisions that seek to enhance ease of doing business will help the Rs 156 bn industry grow at a faster clip.”Saying that the existing process to obtain various permissions from multiple authorities for film shoots is inefficient, cumbersome and counter-productive, Sunir Kheterpal, CEO of Azure Entertainment said the hidden costs also had an adverse impact on budgeting.“It's akin to issues that film exhibitors face due to requirement of multiple permissions. Not that the budgetary impact makes it unviable but ease of shoot permissions can have an overall positive impact on logistics and processes thus bringing in work efficiencies. And that eventually shall lead to positive economics and happy production work force,” added Kheterpal.The minister also announced that anti-camcording provisions, which will be introduced in the Cinematograph Act to control the menace of piracy.“The amendments in the anti-camcording provisions will support the industry’s growth by curtailing illegal recordings of films in cinema halls and will go a long way towards reducing piracy,” added Kapur.Rajesh Mishra, CEO of Indian operations at UFO Moviez, said the government’s initiative to introduce the anti-camcording provision as part of the Cinematography Act will give teeth to the law to take stringent action against the offender. “We are sure this is a very pragmatic step ahead by the government and will ensure the reduction of losses the film industry incurs,” Mishra said.According to Vats the move will ensure that in-theatre pirated recordings now become a penal offense and will act as a strong deterrent to piracy.

from Economic Times http://bit.ly/2BcHmhS