Producers Guild of India organizes mass vaccination campaign

Mumbai: The Producers Guild of India (PGI), the association of Indian film, television, and digital content producers on Monday announced it will conduct a mass vaccination campaign to give coronavirus vaccines to guild members and associated production crews.

The Guild, in a press release, noted that members will be vaccinated across several days in a drive to commence on 1 June at Mehboob Studios, in suburban Bandra. The organizers said that mass vaccination is the single solution to curb the spread of the pandemic, and would also facilitate safer shooting, once production work resumes.

"An activity of such importance and magnitude cannot be carried out singlehandedly, and we are extremely grateful for the support we have received to make this possible. We are happy that we are able to provide this facility to our members, their employees, and the cast and crew of their (respective) productions as we work to get the industry back on its feet again in the weeks ahead," said Producers Guild of India president Sidharth Roy Kapur.

Kapur also thanked production company Excel Entertainment for playing ''a pivotal role in securing the vaccine, as also Mehboob Productions, who very generously offered complimentary use of the spacious Mehboob Studios.''

Due to the second wave of the Covid pandemic, the Maharashtra government has suspended all shooting activities, both indoor and outdoor. Currently, the shooting of a few films and television shows is being carried out outside the state.

Maharashtra, on Sunday, reported 18,600 fresh Covid cases, with the death toll due to Covid-related complications costing 402 human lives, pushing the total number of fatalities to 94,844.