Coldplay concert: Activists move HC against entertainment tax waiver

Petitioners move to Bombay high court to challenge tax collection on upcoming coldplay concert in Inida. (File)

Activists Anjali Damania and Hemant Gavande has moved the Bombay High Court to challenge the entertainment tax waiver given by the state government for the upcoming concert by the popular group Coldplay. The concert which is scheduled to be held in Mumbai on November 19 would be the first time the group would be performing in India.

A two-judge bench of Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice M S Sonak while hearing the case refused to stay the concert. The bench however asked the organisers to be made part of the petition and also ordered the state government to take an undertaking from them that they would be ready to pay the entertainment tax retrospectively if the court orders them to do so at a later date.

Damania and Gavande said they were not against concert but the entertainment tax waiver was undue. Damania said during the India Against Corruption (IAC)’s movement in 2011, the Mumbai Metropolitican Regional Development Authority (MMRDA) had not waived off the tax which was upheld by the court. “This waiver is undue favour shown to the organiser,” the court said.