| Font Size |
"Our industry is already paying huge taxes, so the service tax should not happen. But I am sure the government and the industry knows the best. I am sure the industry will go and tell the government that whatever is happening is not right, we should try and remove it completely," Akshay said here today.
The service tax is effective from this month and film and television actors will be charged 12.36 per cent service tax on their earnings from film, TV shows and endorsements.
Artistes are opposing the move, saying it would cast additional financial burden on them as they were already paying income tax.
"Few films are getting shelved because of the implementation of the service tax. Many producers have locked their doors and have walked away, only big producers and corporates are backing the films," he said.
"If it (implementation of service tax) happens, this will be the biggest thing for the industry. It is not right, especially for the producers," Akshay said.
If the 12.36 per cent service tax is not rolled back, the respective TV and film associations may go on strike from February onwards. They will not release of any films during this period.
In case the Film and Television Producers' Guild of India and Association of Motion Pictures and Television Program Producers (AMPTPP) decide to go ahead with the strike, films including Bejoy Nambiar's 'David', Akshay Kumar starrer 'Special 26', Remo D'Souza's 3D dance film 'Any Body Can Dance' (ABCD), Vivek Oberoi's 'Jayanta Bhai Ki Luv Story' are likely to be affected.
On January 7, actors, directors, theatre owners and others down south went on a hunger-strike in Chennai demanding the service tax to be scrapped.
Film Industry and film actors have fat purses and they need to return to the exchequer reasonable sums. All the film actors including the celebrity anchors of the TVs never record their earnings honestly and never pay their income tax honestly. It is time they declare their actual contractual amounts. While we hear on the TVs that some films that are blockbusters have earned hundreds of crores of rupees in the week after their release, there is no evidence that such huge earning resulted in corresponding amounts to the exchequer of the legitimate taxes. The argument in Akshay Kumar's statement is wholly untenable. If the Film Industry goes on strike, they will be harming the interests of employees of the industry and not of the actors and they are well advised not to throw such threats at the Government whether UPA or any other.
