Dil Raju invested heavily in Samantha’s Shakuntalam which is directed and also co-produced by Gunasekhar. The film has now turned out to be a huge disaster at the box office.
The theatrical returns are less than Rs 5 crores which is less than 10% of the film’s budget. The film will now end up as one of the costliest disasters ever in Telugu cinema.
The production costs are around Rs 60 crores. The promotional costs add another big number to the tally. The OTT deal is for Rs 35 crores, say reports. There is no satellite deal in place which will add to the losses.
The film will now incur losses in upwards of Rs 20 crores to Dil Raju who is said to be the financial resource for the mythological film. Gunasekhar will also be losing a substantial amount of money.
All in all, Shakuntalam has left its producers in a huge mess with unexpectedly high volume of losses.