Salaar box office scam: Netizens call out ‘fake’ bookings; say ‘housefull show in closed cinema’

The fan-wars which erupted owing to the clash between Shah Rukh Khan’s ‘Dunki’ and Prabhas‘ ‘Salaar‘, turned ugly after allegations of a ‘ticketing scam’ began doing the rounds on social media.
According to reports, the Prabhas starrer zoomed past SRK’s ‘Dunki’ earning over Rs 300 crore at the Indian box office, while the latter crossed the Rs 160 crore mark, despite the head-start. As both films gear up for another long weekend at the box office, social media platforms are abuzz with discussions and accusations, linked to box office numbers and ticket sales.

Days after Salaar’s release, netizens claimed that the makers might have engaged in dubious practices by inflating box office figures and showing ‘housefull shows’ even in theatres that apparently shut down. Hashtags like ‘Scammer Salaar’ quickly made the top trends with users accusing the filmmakers of resorting to ‘corporate and proxy bookings’ to artificially boost the film’s box office numbers.

#Salaar morning 6am and 7am shows housefull in Krishna cinema, Buxar (Bihar) which closed 6 years ago,” read a tweet.
Another pointed out, “BookMyShow showed all morning shows housefull but in reality, malls were closed during showtime.”
Still another noted, “Every1 is talking abt the morning shows, but the bigger scam is late night shows. All evening shows r empty,all of a sudden late night shows r HF!! Tht too on a working day!”

According to Times Now, South Industry Expert Ramesh Bala disclosed that certain theatre chains initiated bookings for 9 am shows in Telugu-speaking states without the knowledge of distributors and fans. Bala expressed scepticism, stating, “No one will go for the shows,” and predicted that such a decision would inevitably backfire.
Bala further shed light on the prevalence of proxy bookings in the industry, emphasizing that such practices were not exclusive to ‘Salaar’ and ‘Dunki’. He highlighted instances where booking apps falsely portrayed theatres as ‘housefull,’ only for moviegoers to find them empty upon arrival.

To address the controversy and obtain accurate box office numbers, he recommended relying on figures declared by the film producers, asserting that the ongoing fan-wars concerning inflated or deflated numbers needed to come to an end.