Pune theatre artistes protest against civic app

Theatre groups producers artists and event managers staged a strong protest on Sunday at the Bal Gandharv Rang Mandir premises in Pune against the local civic bodys newly launched booking app The Pune Municipal Corporation PMC launched the lsquoRangyatrarsquo mobile application for online booking of municipal theatres on its 75th anniversary on March 15Alleging that the system is impractical and detrimental to local artists a collective of theatre professionals has formally demanded scrapping of the app There are 15 auditoriums in the city and among them four theatres in the city area experience tremendous booking pressureBabasaheb Patil Maharashtra state president of the Nationalist Congress Partys movie art and culture wings told midday ldquoSince it is an online system anyone can book the theatre from anywhere Large event companies may dominate the booking system leaving small and local theatre groups at a disadvantage Instead of this the civic administration should focus on providing proper basic amenities like clean washrooms and drinking water in the auditoriumsrdquoMarathi actor Prashant Damle said ldquoThe distribution of dates for plays is very close to the heart of any artist Theatre artists overcome all sorts of hurdles to perform PMC has been cooperative in the past But this time they made a decision without understanding our difficulties Though they have launched the app they should not implement it immediately The authorities should organise a meeting with us make necessary changes and then relaunch the apprdquoSunil Mahajan president of the Kothrud branch of Natyaparishad said ldquoThe PMCs culture department did not take anyone into confidence before launching this app PMC usually discusses new initiatives with us but this time they did not inform us We met the authorities and requested them to refrain from launching the app but they hurriedly did so on the PMC anniversaryrdquoAdditionally veteran actors and producers such as Sharad Ponkshe Bhagyashree Desai Ashok Hande and Meghraj Raje Bhosale president of Bal Gandharv Rang Mandir have also expressed their disapproval The theatre community stated that online reservations are inconvenient for theatre managers producers artists and folk performers making it difficult to plan performances efficiently They argued that PMC lacks the infrastructure to handle a high volume of online booking requests raising concerns about mismanagement and technical issues The requirement for advance payments is also a financial burden for many Marathi theatre producersUntil now bookings for PMCrun theatres and cultural centres were made through physical visits to the cultural department In an effort to modernise the process PMC launched the lsquoRangyatrarsquo app on March 12 allowing for digital reservations However 15 major theatre organisations have opposed the move stating that the new system is flawed and may lead to unfair advantages for larger event management companies A delegation representing these organisations met with PMCrsquos cultural department head Sunil Ballal and submitted a memorandum expressing their concernsThe statement was endorsed by several key figures in the industry including Sunil Mahajan Sambad Pravin Barve Parag Publicity Sameer Hampi S H Enterprises Satyajit Dhandekar Rajeshwari Mohan Kulkarni Manoranjan Baba Patil Marathi Film Association Vijay Patwardhan Vijay Patwardhan Foundation Shirish Kulkarni Rangyatra and Yogesh Supekar All Artist Foundation