Chennai: Pay crime thriller director's salary dues, court rules

Chennai: A city court has come to the rescue of a popular crime thriller series director who was taken for a ride by a television programme producing company. The court directed the company to pay the director his salary dues of Rs 5.10 lakh.

In the petition, A. Arul Selvan alias Arul, submitted that Balamurugan was producing programmes under the banner of Sunday Productions for Tamil television channels and he engaged him as a show director cum cameraman since April 2013. He was assigned the job of directing a programme named “Moondravathu Kan” for Vendhar TV from 2013 to June 2014. Later, he was assigned to direct the programme ‘Nambinal Nambugal’ for Zee Tamil TV channel. The series was a popular one on paranormal activities and unnatural phenomena, hosted by yesteryear actor ‘Nizhalgal’ Ravi.

The petitioner said though his salary was fixed as Rs 30,000 per month, Balamurugan never paid him the amount. Arul spent huge amount for his stay, food and other expenses while shooting in outdoors. The producer had paid amounts towards reimbursement of bills and not towards salary. “I engaged reporters in local area and paid them the necessary fees”, Arul said.

Though the company was not given any assignments in 2014, it assured him a salary for 2013 and a stipend of Rs 5,000 from March 2014. When he demanded the payment, the company paid him only Rs 2 lakh in September 2014 towards reimbursement of the bills and had not paid the balance amount of Rs 50,000.

Meanwhile, Balamurugan got a new assignment from Zee Tamil TV and received a huge amount. Later, he promised Arul a salary of Rs 45,000 per month from February to August 2016.  However, Balamurugan terminated Arul’s services without settling the salary dues and he sent him a notice in the next month. In the petition, Arul said Balamurugan was liable to pay him Rs 5.10 lakh. The IV Assistant Judge M. Ilangovan directed Balamurugan to pay the amount.