Polls is Rs 70 crore market for Tollywood

Hyderabad: Tollywood technicians, including lyricists, writers and directors, are making a fast buck this poll season,  thanks to the high demand for ad films from parties and their candidates.

“The election season brings big projects for Tollywood. Most technicians are busy with election work and are making quite a bit of money,” says director V.N. Aditya, who has worked on some promos for the TRS and the Congress. “Other than the parties, candidates who are contesting are also coming to me to do their promotions,” he says.

Director Allani Sridhar is busy too. “This is the best time for small technicians to make some money. I have done ad promotions for TRS and Congress,” he says.

Both Aditya and Sridhar estimate that Tollywood will make around Rs 70 crore from these ad campaigns that include TV ads. “Party promotions will be aired on state-wide channels, but when it comes to the candidates, it will be telecast on local cable networks,” says Sridhar.

Vishweshwar Reddy, who is contesting on a TRS ticket, has approached Aditya for promotional ads. “For every two to three days they wanted a new ad, so we are working on creating new and better ones,” says the director.

While Aditya is doing the lyrics and dialogues himself, others are approaching top writers like Chandrabose, Ananth Sriram, Suddala Ashok Teja and Sirasri.
According to a source, a 20-member team from Tollywood is working for the Telugu Desam. “Recently popular director and actor Allari Ravi Babu did a few video promotions for the party,” says a source. Raghavendra Rao is the head of this team.

“Apart from the technicians, this is a great time for singers and music directors. All the promotions need songs and for that they are hiring more singers,” says director B. Jaya. She adds that the trend started with late NTR when he used Telugu cinema technicians for promotions and gradually other parties picked up the trend.

“Interestingly most of the lyricists pen the lyrics on the lines of popular songs of Telugu cinema,” Jaya says, adding that all the studios are also busy during elections.

“I can’t say how much, but it’s going to be a huge amount that is pumped into Tollywood during elections,” she says.