JTHJ and SOS incurs loss on Bal Thackeray’s death

“Jab Tak Hai Jaan” and “Son of Sardar” had an ugly spat just before the release of their film on the same day, on Diwali (13^th of November).
“JabTak Hai Jaan” was to release in 2000 theatres and “Son of Sardar” in 500 theatres. However, Ajay Devgan Productions took Yash Raj Films to court over them allegedly trying to stop the release of “SOS”.
However, what they did not see coming was the death of Bal Thackeray on Sunday. Bal Thackeray the most prominent leader of Shiv Sena died on the 17^th of November, 2012.
This led to a shut down on Sunday. Maharashtra came to a standstill on this day with all the cinemas being closed. Shoots of television serials were cancelled; entertainment channels were blacked out by the cable operators in certain parts of Mumbai. Film shoots to be done with on that day had also been rescheduled to a later date.
The shoot of two of Karan Johar’s films “Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani” and “Ungli”, Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s film “Ram Leela” and Ram Gopal Verma’s film on 26/11 also had to be pushed back to another date due to the mishap. 
This upheaval in Maharashtra led to a great loss for the two big budget films. An Exhibitor-distributor Akshaye Rathi said “We are expecting losses of roughly Rs. 3-4 cr for JTHJ and Rs. 2.5 cr for SOS.”
These two films have been the two of the biggest releases of this year and a complete shut down on Sunday incurred heavy losses. However, as there are no other releases until the 30^th of November, with “Talaash”, the two films are expected to make up for the lost business in the coming days.
Exhibitors who have incurred losses are greatly saddened by this development. Girish Wankhede, who is the deputy GM of Cinemax India have said “Over Saturday and Sunday, we lost Rs. 2 cr in total.”
Regular customers of Big Cinemas, who had already bought the tickets for Sunday had been given choices of either asking for a refund or watching the movie on another convenient date, informed Ashish Saxena of Big Cinemas.
On whether the cinemas would be reopening the next day, nobody could give a confirmation as it all depended on the instructions that would be provided by the police.
Ashish Saxena, reiterated this saying “It depends on the instructions we get from the police.”