When the Andhra Pradesh government announced that the ticket prices for movies would be fixed by the government and that the tickets would have to be bought online, through an online platform run by the government, the entire exhibition industry of the state was shattered. To top it up, the government also said that no permissions would be given for any extra, special or benefit shows, which made the situation much worse.
Many theatres shut down in recent times, having run into terrible losses because of the low prices of tickets, and now, with the government’s new restrictions, it is likely that all theatres will shut down in the near future. In view of the rising number of new omicron cases in the state, the AP government has imposed a night curfew, from 11 PM to 5 AM, and has allowed only 50% occupancy in theatres.
With the night curfew, the fourth show would have to be cancelled for every movie, and with the 50% occupancy, the income for theatres would be much lesser. Given that distributors have already bought some movies releasing for Snakrnathi, it is expected that all theatres would shut down after the festival.