Roopbani CEO sees cinema growth in India’s underserved small towns
Roopbani Cinema CEO Vishek Chauhan says exhibition growth will come from affordable, quality screens in tier-3 and tier-4 markets, where more than 16,000 pin codes still lack a cinema. He also flags premium formats and regional content as demand drivers.
What happened
Roopbani Cinema CEO Vishek Chauhan says India’s exhibition growth lies in affordable, quality screens in under-served tier-3 and tier-4 towns. He highlights a
Key facts
- Spider-Man: Brand New Day collected Rs256 crore in three days
- India had about 10,033 cinema screens in 2025, up 1% year-on-year
- Single screens fell from around 10,000 in 2010 to under 7,000 by 2019
- Andhra Pradesh lost 54 screens and Karnataka lost 29 screens in 2025
- An estimated 1,000-plus single screens closed in five years
- Multiplex screens total 6,000-6,500; single screens total 3,500-4,000
- More than 16,000 pin codes have no cinema screen
- Around 10% of Indians visit a cinema annually; 81% prefer theatres
- Premium Mumbai seats can cost Rs500 versus Rs100 in small towns
Why this matters
Target partnerships or acquisitions involving regional exhibitors, real-estate access, and scalable low-capex screen formats that can accelerate entry into underpenetrated non-metro markets.
What to watch
- Announcements of tier-3/tier-4 screen pipelines, franchise agreements or single-screen conversion programs from Roopbani, PVR INOX, Miraj, Mukta A2 and regional operators.
- Sustained growth in regional-language box office, especially in markets where local films outperform Hindi releases.
- District-level evidence that new screens maintain occupancy outside opening weekends and tentpole releases.
- Changes in film rental terms, theatrical windows or distributor minimum-guarantee requirements that alter small-market unit economics.
- Mall development, high-street retail expansion, power reliability and digital-payment penetration in targeted districts.
- Further single-screen closures without replacement, which would increase local monopolies but also signal stressed exhibition economics.
- Ticket-price inflation relative to local incomes and the adoption rate of discounted weekday, family and subscription products.
- Map pin-code-level white spaces against district population, income, language mix, mall/high-street supply, travel time to the nearest screen and regional box-office performance.
- Prioritize modular 2-4 screen formats with lower fixed costs, flexible auditoriums and landlord revenue-share agreements rather than metro-style multiplex builds.
- Build regional-content programming teams and secure local-language release windows, festival calendars and talent-led promotions before entering new states.
- Use membership, mobile ticketing, UPI-linked offers and family/group bundles to reduce ticket-price sensitivity and generate repeat visits.
- Develop an asset-light partner model for existing single-screen owners: digital projection, recliner/premium retrofit, centralized booking, F&B procurement and operating standards.
- Test premium formats selectively in affluent district hubs, but keep the core proposition affordable to avoid overbuilding premium capacity in low-frequency markets.