NEW DELHI: The yellow alert following rising Omicron cases and the weekend curfew starting today is a big blow for event management companies and the wedding industry. Many of them have been forced to cancel bookings.
The Event and Entertainment Management Association has written to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and appealed for greater attention to this sector affected severely by restrictions imposed due to the pandemic in the last two years. The letter emphasises that this industry has been the worst hit and it has been overlooked when concessions were granted to other industries.
“We are staring at certain industry deaths. 90% of the business is cancelled or postponed followed by 50-80% retrenchment of our current workforce. Each company suffered losses of a minimum of `1 crore and around 97% of the companies will need to raise a capital or debt from institutions or shareholders’ funding in order to survive,” read the letter.
It further stated, “We have highlighted our concerns in various petitions submitted to the government, seeking for urgent steps to help us sustain in business as there have been hardly any revenues.” Sonaal Gautam, general manager at L’Elegant Banquet Halls, said, “The government ordered a complete shutdown of banquet halls without giving us time to arrange or shift venues.
Thankfully, we have properties in UP and Haryana. We tried shifting our wedding venues to places there was no cap on visitors. There were many clients who had to postpone or cancel functions. We request the government to allow reopening of halls with restrictions. There are many functions coming up after Lohri on January 13.”
An official from another banquet hall in Mayapuri, said, “Since we did not have another property outside Delhi, we couldn’t shift any of our functions. We had to return booking amounts and felt sorry for our clients.” Restrictions under the Graded Response Action Plan include closure of banquet halls and restricting wedding and funeral gatherings to 20 persons.
What the industry seeks
The letter appealed for greater attention to the sector affected by restrictions imposed. It emphasised that this industry has been the worst hit and it has been overlooked