Kuselan producer settles dues

One of the most hyped 2008 films was Rajnikanth's Tamil movie Kuselan. It also turned out to be the biggest failure of the year with several distributors and theatre owners losing a lot of money.

Pyramid Saimira, the Indian-International Entertainment company with its presence in America, Malaysia, Singapore, England, China, apart from India, produced the film. The company that has invested over Rs 579 crore in movies for the last four years suffered tremendous loss after Kuselan bombed. However, the company took the loss stoically. 'We understand the risks involved in the movie business and do not hold anyone responsible for the loss,' it said, in a press statement.

Meanwhile, the huge loss incurred by the company is said to be the reason behind the postponement of the other high profile venture, Kamal Haasan's Marmayogi.

Since theatre owners and distributors lost out on a lot of money, the company announced that it would compensate for the losses incurred. But the distributors of North Arcot, Coimbatore, Tiruchy, Thirunelveli Districts requested Pyramid Saimira to reconsider the decision, and now the company has decided to hand over full reimbursement amount to the distributors and theatre owners.

'Although there is no clause stating reimbursement of the money in the agreement, we, on humanitarian grounds, agreed to the plea of the distributors and theatre owners to give one Rs crore and fifty thousand as their contribution along with the Rs five crores given by the producers,' the press statement added.

 As its first move, Pyramid Saimira has reimbursed the movie theatres which screened Kuselan. The theatre owners and the distributors of the movie for South Arcot, Chengalpet, have mutually agreed to solve the issue amicably. The theatre owners of North Arcot, Coimbatore, Tiruchy and Thirunelveli have not yet reached an agreement with the Distributors Association, and hence the process of their reimbursement amount has been delayed.

Pyramid Saimira has also agreed to extend the reimbursement to distributors and theatre owners of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. With this, the company hopes that the entire issue relating to Kuselan is fully resolved to the satisfaction of all.