A single-judge bench of the Madras High Court comprising of Justice Anita Sumanth was approached with a Writ Petition filed before the Hon’ble High Court praying for a Writ of Mandamus directing the respondents to take action against the Chennai & Tamil Nadu cinema theatre owners who charged more than the actual cinema ticket rate fixed by the government.
It was ordered that the State should continue with the measures for monitoring of ticket collection being satisfied with the steps taken and a suitable decision also to be taken on the fate of excess charges found to have been collected by the cinema theatres by the Cinema Monitoring Committee.
Brief Facts:
The present writ petition with other two writ petitions referred to a matter of Public Interest Litigation. They were filed seeking direction against excessive price charged by the Chennai & Tamil Nadu cinema theatre owners who were charging excess of ticket charges upon the release of three specific movies namely Bairavaa, Singham–III and Kabali. The petitioner before this had filed a writ petition seeking the issue of a writ of mandamus directing the respondent to take action against the cinema theatre owners, in Tamil Nadu who collected excessive ticket charges while showing new movies such as “Yennai Arindhal, Puli, Vedalam, Thoongavanam and Thanga Magan”, etc., and to stop this practice of the theatre owners, collecting excessive revenue than the government fixed prices.
The Court in previous orders, held that the practice was violative of law prescribed and respondents were directed to file status reports on the matter on survey of theatres over the state and same report was filed before the court by vide counter affidavit. In adherence to these reports the state stared taking actions against these theatres and prayed before the court to take note of this progress.
Contentions of the Petitioner:
The learned counsel for the petitioner claimed that the respondents continue to be remiss in controlling the menace that he alleges and hence these writ petitions were filed. The respondent had failed to take note of the menace. The petitioner submitted that even though the Government had fixed the minimum and maximum price of tickets, the theatre owners continued to sell tickets at a rate higher than the fixed rate.
Contentions of the Respondents:
The Learned Additional Advocate General for respondents submitted that the State Government is very serious about taking action on the issue and the Cinema Monitoring Committee is working towards the cause in addition to the measures that are being taken. It was also asserted that vide another government order, the Home (Cinema) Department had made amendments with respect to fixing rates of tickets in A/C and Non-A/C theatres in Municipal Corporations, municipalities, town panchayats, village panchayats around the state fixing both minimum and maximum ticket charges.
Observations of the Court:
The Hon’ble Court observed and recorded the submission of parties on the issue. It looked into the Status Report filed by the State with respect to the actions taken by them with respect to theatres which were found charging rates more than the rate fixed by the government. The previous orders were reiterated. Hence, it was ordered that the State continues with the measures for monitoring of ticket collection being satisfied with the steps taken and a suitable decision also to be taken on the fate of excess charges found to have been collected by the cinema theatres by the Cinema Monitoring Committee. As on date, the excess charges are retained by the theatre owners and the State only imposes a penalty for the violations detected which is to be followed. Furthermore, the present writ petitions at once were closed with no costs and consequently, connected miscellaneous petitions were closed.
Decision of the Court:
The petitioner’s writ petition with the connected matter was closed as above with. Consequently, connected miscellaneous petitions were closed with order to the state for maintaining surveillance on the issue.
Case Title: G. Devarajan vs. the Chief Secretary
Coram: Honourable Dr. Justice Anita Sumanth
Case No.: W.P. No. 34706 of 2016
Advocate for the Petitioner: Mr. G. Devarajan, Party-in-Person.
Advocate for the Respondent: Mr. R. Silambannan.
Read Judgment @LatestLaws.com
Picture Source :