Looks like Karan Johar’s production house Dharma, and Ekta Kapoor’s Balaji might get into some trouble. According to the Economic Times, the Income Tax department conducted a survey last week, on seven production houses, in the wake of suspicion that these production houses haven’t been deducting enough tax while paying the extra artistes in their films. For those who don’t know, the ‘extra artistes’ refer to those who appear on screen as a part of the crowd in weddings, restaurants, malls etc.
The seven production houses include Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions, Ekta Kapoor’s Balaji Telefilms, Excel Entertainment (Ritesh Sidhwani and Farhan Akthar’s company), Vashu Bhagnani’s Pooja Entertainment & Films, Dinesh Vijan’s Maddock Films, Luv Films, and Jar Pictures. The issue is about the TDS charged on the wages of extra artistes, the applicable TDS (tax deducted at source) is 10%, but the producers have not been following this, and have been deducting 2% tax before paying them. As per the report in Economic Times, a senior tax official confirmed that the raids were conducted on some production houses, but didn’t share details and stated that no decision has been taken as of yet.
The report further states that none of the Bollywood production companies have commented on this issue.
Meanwhile, Economic Times also reports that out of all the production houses that have been cited, Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions is the largest and had made a turnover of about INR 500 crore in the year 2019, followed by Balaji Telefilms, with 460 crore.
Image Source: Instagram/ektarkapoor/karanjohar