Trump’s decision to impose 100% tariff on non-U.S. movies will impact revenue of Indian films in U.S. market, says Producers Guild of India

The Indian diaspora in the U.S. spent approximately $100 million a year to watch Telugu, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Punjabi, Bengali and other Indian language movies released in U.S., said, Producers Guild of India on Monday (May 5, 2025).
| Photo Credit: VIVEK BENDRE

The Indian diaspora in the U.S. spent approximately $100 million a year to watch Telugu, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Punjabi, Bengali and other Indian language movies released in Uncle Sam’s country, said, Producers Guild of India on Monday (May 5, 2025) in its response to Donald Trump’s decision to impose 100% tariff on non-U.S. movies.

Indians are the largest single-origin Asian group in the U.S., at some 5.2 million, accounting for 1.6% of the country’s total population.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement of a 100% Tariff on feature films made outside of the U.S. has dampened the spirit of Bollywood and rest of the cinema fraternity across the country.

Shibasish Sarkar, President, Producers Guild of India told The Hindu that: “President Trump’s 100% tariff will impact any revenue which Indian films generate in the U.S. market. Indian films do approximately $100 million annually. Definitely there will be impact in footfall if ticket prices go up and it will also cut into the share of producers.”

According to Mr. Sarkar, not only theatrical but any other streams of revenue or business coming from digital or satellite or any other platforms of revenue or business from U.S. will be impacted.

Telugu commands the largest share of Indian movies released in the U.S., followed by Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Punjabi and all major Indian languages films have theatrical and other kinds of releases in the U.S.

Ashish Kulkarni, an AVGC (Animation, Visual Effects, Gaming, and Comics) industry expert and founder of Pune-based production house, Screenyug Creations said such unreasonable hike in tariff was quite unfair and one should not deprive the Indian diaspora of the soft power (entertainment content) of their origin country.

“Under such a high tariff regime, all channels of movie showing and movie viewing will be impacted and become more costly. It will overall increase the cost of content consumption for the Indian diaspora,” added Mr. Kulkarni.