Most powerful entity in Tamil Movie Industry
It appears as though Censor Board wakes up with daily mood swings. After being lenient on Nanban and Vettai in awarding U certificate allowing lip-lock scenes, Censor has decided to get tough on Muppozhudhum Un Karpanaigal (MUK). Many dialogues have been silenced and many scenes have been cut indiscriminately. The makers were staring at the mangled product in disbelief and wondering what to do next. MUK Director agreed to accept all the cuts and got the "U" certificate for this movie releasing this Friday.
Censor Board realizes the enormous power unknowingly given by Amma
It is now official that Censor Board is the most powerful entity now in the Tamil movie Industry. It comes as a surprise to many who might have thought it is CM Jayalalitha (Amma) or a Production house or a Hero. This power shift started to happen with the recent decision of state government to give Entertainment Tax waiver of 30% for "U" certified movies. During the process, Amma has unknowingly given a lot of power to the Censor Board, which is run by Central Government. In order to understand the gravity of the irony, Let's say Jaya TV produces and releases a movie, if Censor board gives a "U/A" certificate, even Amma cannot get Entertainment Tax waiver.
So much power is now vested in Censor that the board realized as soon as how much Nanban and Vettai were benefited by their lenient certification. Industry sources quote anywhere between 25 to 35 Crores made by these two makers as a result of the censor certification. So, one can quickly calculate the level of negative incentives have been created for possible corruption and bribery.
It is also unfortunate that in order to make up for the loss of potential revenue from Entertainment Tax waivers, the Government is forced to raise the taxes and price on people in order to balance their budgets. The bottomline is that the government and Producer council should stop monkeying around with all these new rules, regulations, taxes, tariffs, subsidies, etc. in order for the movie industry to work effectively and efficiently.