Poor pay hike: No south films from Sep 7th

The row over revising wage hikes of film employees is snowballing into a major crisis as the industry in the country's south — comprising Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada — has decided not to start new projects from tomorrow. The ban is expected to take a toll on around 25 major endeavors that are slated for Sankranti release, leaving at state a cumulative Rs 480-crore business.

The joint decision comes after three days of talks in Chennai between producers from the four film industries and the Film Employees' Federation of South India (FEFSI) failed to reach a conclusion.

Tollywood (as the Telugu film industry is known these days), which alone garnered Rs 150 crore in

business this Sankranti, is lining up mega-budget movies like Dabbang's Telugu remake Gabbar Singh

starring Pawan Kalyan, and Mahesh Babu's The Businessman being directed by Puri Jagannath (Bbuddah Hoga Tera Baap fame) for the harvest festival in 2012.

Kalyan, however, is hopeful that the ban would only help film producers streamline their schedules and thereby save costs. "We don't expect the stalemate to continue till Sankranti. We are putting all efforts to end this much before this Diwali," he says.