Some decisions taken at the ANNUAL GENERAL BODY MEETING of the TAMIL FILM ACTIVE PRODUCERS ASSOCIATION
- VPF Payment – For the past 15 years, Tamil film producers have been paying VPF fees to Qube, UFO, PRO VA, Sony and other digital projection companies on a weekly basis. However, for many years, VPF fees have not been charged for English and Hollywood films screened on the same projector. Digital companies should end this discrimination. Therefore, this general committee requests that digital projection companies stop charging VPF fees from April 1, 2026. This general committee would like to inform digital projection companies that producers will pay only One Time Content Delivery fees from April 1, 2026. Theatres should install digital projectors in their theatres either on their own or on hire. Theatres that have their own digital projectors should only pay One-Time Content Delivery Charge. We would like to inform all theatre owners that they should not pay VPF fee. (From 1st April 2026, Producers will pay only the Content Delivery Charges like it is being charged currently for Hollywood films and shall not pay the Virtual Print Fee charged for Digital Projects kept in theatres. Digital projectors must be owned or hired by Theatres on their own and VPF towards that should not be charged to Producers).
- There are one thousand one hundred and fifty theatres in Tamil Nadu. Our association has demanded that a Centralized, Online Box Office Tracking Software System should be introduced with integrated software to bring transparency in box office collections. The general committee requests the Tamil Nadu Theatre and Multiplex Owners Association and the Tamil Nadu Film Current Distributors Association to extend their full cooperation in bringing out such an integrated software. (There are incidents of wrong/under reporting of collection by theatres and to prevent any such unethical practice by theatres, it is necessary to go live with an Integrated Online Box Office collection tracking system linking all theatres in Tamil Nadu with a centralized server. That server access will be given only to the particular Producer and Distributor for their film to know the collections of their film for each show).
- Companies like Book My Show, Zomato District which charge fees for online ticket booking should also give a share to the producers of the respective film. Equal share of online ticket charges/convenience charges to be given to all three involved in a film, namely theatre owners, producers and the company that does online ticket booking. Viewers book online only for the film. Therefore, this general committee also requests the companies that collect online ticket fees to give an equal share to the producers of the film. TFAPA demands one third share of the Convenience Fee/Online Ticketing charges from companies booking tickets online like Book My Show/Zomato District as the audiences are booking tickets for a film and it is fair and reasonable Producers of such films get a fair share (one Third) along with Theatre owners and Online Ticketing companies.
- The members of the Tamil Film Producers Association have decided to fully cooperate with the FESRA organization started by the South India Workers Federation (FEFSI) to record the attendance of workers with the help of SWIPE CARD and pay them weekly salaries accordingly. Since salaries can be paid to the workers properly through this digital attendance register, our association has come forward to support this initiative of the federation. (TFAPA is agreeing to support FEFSI to implement the Digital recording of attendance using Swipe Card by workers and making payment as per the software to the workers).
- A request was made by our association a few years ago to grant permission for film shooting in Tamil Nadu through Single Window Clearance and to allow shooting in Chennai during daytime. For that, a study was made to find out which streets in Chennai are suitable for shooting during daytime and details were given. This general committee requests the Tamil Nadu government to grant that permission as soon as possible. (TFAPA has submitted to Tamil Nadu State Government the locations and roads where the shootings can be held during the daytime (currently only during night times shooting in roads can be done) so that Producers need not go all the way to Pondicherry to shoot road scenes. We seek the TN Government to approve that request for single-window clearance for shooting approval so that Producers can shoot in Chennai and other cities during the day time and also in various locations which were listed. Currently many State Governments provide this single-window clearance to give shooting permissions and we seek the same support from TN Government.)
We hereby inform you on behalf of this general committee that we are going to send the above requests as a petition to the State Government and the concerned film industry associations.
Thus,
Office-Bearers of Tamil Film Active Producers Association
T.G. Thyagarajan – President,
T. Siva – General Secretary,
G Dhananjheyan – Treasurer
S.R. Prabhu – Vice President,
S.S. Lalit Kumar – Vice President,
Mukesh R. Mehta – Joint Secretary,
S. Vinod Kumar – Joint Secretary,
Director-Producer K.S. Ravikumar,
Director-Producer Sundar C and
EC Members of TAMIL FILM ACTIVE PRODUCERS ASSOCIATION.
