A district consumer forum in Bengaluru ordered PVR to mention the actual time of screening on the movie ticket and not the time after the commercials start. A man moved the forum complaining about PVR ‘wasting his time’ by showing ads before the start of the movie, as per reports.

Abhishek MR reportedly filed a complaint in January 2024 against PVR Cinemas, ticketing platform BookMyShow, and INOX (now merged with PVR) for wasting his time by showing long commercial ads in December 2023 during a show of ‘Sam Bahadur’.

He claimed that 25 minutes of his time was wasted because of these commercials, reportedly preventing him from returning to the office on time after the movie as he had planned.

The forum, ruling in his favour, said that time is money and 25-30 minutes of sitting idle is not a less time. It said that it is very hard for busy people with tight schedules to watch unnecessary advertisements, as per reports.

It did not put any blame on BookMyShow as a ticketing platform for the ads shown by the movie halls.

The complainant had recorded 23 minutes of commercials shown at the PVR. Which, the latter argued that the complainant had breached the privacy laws, which was rejected by the forum stating that no part of the movie was recorded.

PVR also stated that they were also showing Public Service Announcements (PSAs) mandated by the State and Central Government, however, it was found that only 5% of the time was occupied by the PSAs among all the commercials.

It was also argued by the cinema hall chain that the commercials help people who come late to the halls and are subjected to security checks at the entrance, so they do not miss the movie. The forum, however, observed that punctual moviegoers should not be subjected to commercials for that.

The consumer forum ordered the cinema to mention the actual time of screening the movie on the ticket and ordered to pay a total of ₹28,000 to the complainant for inconvenience and legal expenses, as per reports.

The reports also suggested a ₹1 lakh fine to PVR for allegedly engaging in unfair trade practices.