On the inexhaustible list of things our capital city is infamous for, certainly amongst the top few would be its outrageous and downright flagrant corruption. Right from palm-greasing a traffic cop to more severe cases of bribery in state administration tothe common you-scratch-my-back-and-I’ll-scratch-yours attitude. From the ground-up all the way to the top, corruption has eaten its way into the bones of the system and has come to become a term distinctly synonymous with Delhi.
This has been the number one reason why many international artists have refused to perform in Delhi and several event planners have steered clear of ‘unnecessary hassles’ by avoiding hosting any shows in the city.
But all that is about to change claims
Tourism Minister Kapil Mishra, part of the AAP led Delhi government cabinet.
In a recent industry meet Kapil Mishra assured the full house of event planners that the state will not encourage the trend of complimentary passes for any shows. One of the top grievances of event planners is that state officials and persons of ‘influence’ demand complimentary passes the cost of which is eventually incurred by the organizers. If organizers do not oblige then they are faced with a separate set of issues including obstruction or non-compliance by the officials.
Vijay Nair, Founder of Only Much Louder – the organizer of music festival
NH7 Weekender comments, “Corruption is rampant everywhere but in Delhi it is taken to a completely different level. The kind of money we are required to spend towards feeding state officials, licensing officers, police etc. is extremely demotivating.”
He adds, “Even if a planner tries to organize something lawfully and with absolute integrity, it all seems for nothing when the profits are marginalized due to demands for unreasonable quantities of free passes. Once we were asked to send across 800 passes which was outrageous. Of course we did not comply but that said it wasn’t exactly smooth sailing for us after that.”
Inviting event organizers to host events in the capital Minister Kapil Mishra stated that the government would take necessary measures to ensure that processes requiring face-time with government officials is reduced and procedures can easily happen online. Strong steps have already been taken towards single window clearance for event licensing in the past few weeks. He has also guaranteed a period of 36 months towards cleaning the river Yamuna following which its banks would play host to world-class events.
“We are waiting with bated breath for the changes to be implemented in the state system”, says Vijay. “We have seen some promising glimpses in the past weeks and hope the event industry continues to receive support from the government. Things are looking up and the entire industry is hopeful and excited. Instead of Gurgaon or Noida we now look forward to hosting NH7 Weekender in New Delhi.”
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