The death toll due to the blasts, which was 16, would have been much higher that fateful night had Konark theatre, which is just a stone’s throw away from the second blast site, retained its old movie timings. It was indeed lucky that the cinema hall had changed its evening’s first show timing from 7 pm to 6.15 pm a few months back.
“If the first show’s timing was still at 7 pm, people would have been thronging from 6.40 pm onwards, which would have killed more number of people,” said Rajaratnam, the manager of the theatre.
The first blast took place at around 6.55 pm.
There were 115 persons that fateful evening in Konark theatre, which was screening the Telugu movie, Nayak.
“I was standing outside the theatre when I heard the blast. Within 10 seconds, the second explosion took place. It was so powerful that everyone inside the hall heard it and rushed out,” explained M Suryanarayan, picture representative of Nayak, whose job is to report to his distributor the movie’s faring at the theatre.
The theatre in itself did not sustain any major damage - a window near the ticket stall had shattered due to the explosion’s intensity. “We found few shrapnels in the premises,” Suryanarayan said.
Low turnout on Tuesday
Kornark theatre, which began functioning from Tuesday, witnessed a downfall in terms of the number of people visiting the theatre. On Tuesday morning, only 32 persons had gone to the theatre, indicating that the fear of blasts is still prevalent in movie goers.
“It is the movie’s (Nayak) 49th day of screening, so the numbers will obviously be low. But the numbers are lower than usual because of the blasts,” Rajaratnam said.
The manager hoped that a new movie, which will be aired this Friday, will bring some life to the cinema hall, which can seat 1,026 persons.