FILM SHOOTING AT JJ HOSPITAL CAMPUS HALTED AFTER ROW | 14 March, 2024

A film shooting at the state-run government JJ Hospital at Byculla in Bombay was stopped on March 13 following the intervention of the medical education department. The production company, which had constructed a courtroom set in the boys’ common room for a 10-day shooting schedule, received a communication from the department to stop the shooting.

As per the original agreement between the state and the film company, the shooting should’ve been completed by March 11. But when the shooting commenced after the period, the authorities had to ask them to leave.

A controversy had erupted over the permission for the shooting. While the public works department had charged rent from the producers, the hospital administration had taken NOCs from the nursing college and the boys’ common room, both of which were to be affected. But some doctors and medical teachers pointed to a 20-year old ban on shootings in state government-run hospitals after patients were inconvenienced during a film shooting at the state-run St. George’s Hospital in 2004. A high-level panel had then recommended that state-run medical colleges should not be rented out for film shootings.