Admn mulls heritage status for Kiran Cinema

Rejects proposal to tinker with design

The adage “old is gold” may not hold true for the owners of Kiran Cinema in Sector 22 but it is apt for the Chandigarh administration, which is mulling over granting “heritage status” to the city’s oldest theater.

With land prices soaring in the city and multiplexes becoming the “in thing”, the owners of Kiran Cinema were too looking forward to raking in the moolah by going in for its conversion, like their other counterparts, but the UT administration is in no mood to oblige them.

The administration has rejected their proposal to tinker with the building and its design as the same was approved and made by a team led by Le Corbusier.

The cinema hall on 1,800 sq yd plot in Sector 22 came into being in 1953. The owners said since it was an open offer to all cinema houses under the notification released by the finance department for conversion into the multiplexes to match with times, the administration should not discriminate against them.

While admitting that they had rejected the proposal for allowing the conversion of the hall, finance secretary Sanjay Kumar said they were mulling over the issue of giving it a heritage status.More