NILGIRIS: The horticulture department has temporarily banned film shootings at eight parks, including Government Botanical Garden (GBG) and Government Rose Garden (GRG) for the next three months starting from April. The ban will come into force from today. The decision was taken as hundreds and thousands of tourist will visit these parks to enjoy their holidays.
Due to its greenery, mountain views, the parks owned by the horticulture department remained the most sought after destinations for Kollywood, Bollywood and Mollywood film industries.
The horticulture department felt that allowing film shoots would be a disturbance to the tourists during the summer.
An official from the horticulture department said, “We were allowing the film crews only after getting proper permission from our horticulture department director in Chennai, and they had to pay a minimum of Rs 25,000 to a maximum of Rs 1 lakh for a day of shooting.
However, we have temporarily banned all the film shootings in the GBG in Ooty and Sims Park in Coonoor as the number of tourists visiting these places would be more than usual since colleges and schools have shut down for summer vacations.”
He added, “We have also planned to conduct summer festivals starting from the vegetable show on May 3 at Nehru Park in Kotagiri and conclude with the plantation crops show on May 30 to June 1 at Katteri Park. Spices, flower, rose and fruit shows have also been planned.
In this regard, the workers were also actively engaged in trimming and planting the saplings. We want to carry out the work peacefully and successfully conduct the festival. So we are going to fully concentrate only on these festivals.”