How police complaint by Mumbai lawyer who couldn’t get Coldplay tickets led to probe against BookMyShow, others

As part of its probe, the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Mumbai police has issued a summons to Ashish Hemrajani, CEO of Big Tree Entertainment Private Limited, the company that owns BookMyShow, and the company’s technical head, for inquiry.

“I was disappointed that I did not get a ticket. However, when I checked with nearly 100 people who I know are regulars at concerts, none of them had gotten a ticket. This made me suspicious. I then decided to approach the police as I knew that something was amiss,” Vyas said.

“They have a lot to explain for logging out or not allowing fans in India to access the BookMyShow app and site sharp at noon on Sunday, September 22, for sufficient time to let them sell the tickets to black marketeers/ticket scalpers/bots and whoever they wanted thereby cheating Coldplay fans,” Vyas said.

Vyas said he filed the complaint on behalf of all Coldplay fans across India “for the online ticketing scam committed…in sale of tickets for Coldplay’s Live Concert scheduled to take place at D Y Patil Stadium, Navi Mumbai in January 2025”.

The band will perform in Navi Mumbai on January 18, 19, and 21 next year.

Vyas alleged in his complaint that BookMyShow and Live Nation Entertainment, through their promoters/directors/key managerial personnel, have indulged in foul play by logging out genuine fans and then deploying ticket bots to create an artificial digital queue to deprive genuine purchasers of the opportunity to buy tickets.

The tickets were sold out within a small window of time and were available on the ticketing site Viagogo, where they are priced exorbitantly high, a clear indication that they were made available to Viagogo in bulk, which needs to be thoroughly investigated, the complaint states.

“It is apparent that BookMyShow and Live Nation Entertainment have colluded to black-market the concert tickets to black marketeers/Viagogo, who are now selling tickets at prices 30 to 50 times higher than their original price,” Vyas said in his complaint.

He also alleged that BookMyShow and Live Nation Entertainment cheated the public at large and hence the complaint has been filed seeking registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against both organisations as well as their promoters, directors and key managerial personnel for commission of various offences, including cheating, organised crime, criminal breach of trust etc.

“I am also in the process of filing a PIL before the Bombay High Court seeking appropriate guidelines for such major events,” Vyas added.

Ticket scalping, a concern

Police officials and lawyers The Indian Express spoke to said that there was a need for guidelines in ticketing, especially with issues like scalping tickets and reselling them at high prices becoming a regular thing with highly sought-after events like concerts of Coldplay, Diljit Dosanjh and even World Cup cricket matches becoming a regular occurrence.

Ticket scalping is the act of reselling tickets, usually in bulk, for admission to events. Tickets are bought from licenced sellers and then sold for a price determined by the individual or company in possession of the tickets.

In the case of Coldplay, social media users identified two reselling platforms, Viagogo and Gigsberg, as selling tickets at high rates within minutes of it going live on BookMyShow. Many also raised questions about how these reselling platforms got access to tickets across categories.

BookMyShow, however, released a statement late on Tuesday stating, “BookMyShow has no association with any ticket-selling/reselling platforms such as Viagogo and Gigsberg or third-party individuals for the purpose of reselling Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour 2025 in India.”

“Scalping is strictly condemned and punishable by law in India. We have filed a complaint with the police authorities and will provide complete support to them in the investigation. We urge you not to fall victim to these scams. Any tickets bought from unauthorised sources will be at the risk of the consumer and can turn out to be fake tickets. Beware of such scammers,” the statement added.

When contacted after the summons was issued, a BookMyShow spokesperson said, “At BookMyShow and BookMyShow Live, we have worked hard to ensure every fan had a fair chance to secure tickets, providing clear, step-by-step booking guides and maintaining transparent communication through all our official channels. We implemented a queueing system to manage the overwhelming demand and addressed issues caused by suspicious and malicious traffic within minutes, causing a brief delay, but ensuring minimal disruption for genuine fans. Due to the unprecedented demand, a third Mumbai show was added shortly thereafter, which also received a fantastic response.”

Advocate Pradeep Gharat said that if there is a notice given that tickets are to be purchased from one platform at certain rates, those trying to skew the process can be booked under sections of the Prevention of Black Marketing Act, 1980.

“There has to be action taken in such cases or else any Tom, Dick and Harry will start selling tickets. In such cases, even reselling at a higher rate is wrongful as the gain is not one obtained by legal methods like a retailer purchasing from a wholesaler. In such cases, advantage is being taken of the high demand of a certain event which can be charged under the Prevention of Black Marketing Act, 1980,” he said.

He likened it to the touts who would stand outside cinema houses back in the day selling tickets in black against whom action was taken by the police.

Vyas said that broadly speaking, reselling is allowed in India where there are platforms like Olx where articles are resold. However, he added, “Even when it comes to Amazon, they display who the seller is. In this case, these secondary market websites do not show you the seller. The question is where they got the tickets from if they just claimed to be a platform,” Vyas said.

As per Vyas, the offence should be registered under criminal breach of trust. “If the ticket window of a cinema house from where users have to purchase the tickets is shut, it is indirectly forcing fans to purchase from touts outside who are selling at higher rates. Hence, they too are complicit in the crime,” he added.

An IPS officer, however, said that in cases of criminal breach of trust, the party whose trust has been breached has to give a complaint, which in this case would be Coldplay. “If the police investigation reveals that bots were used to purchase tickets or there is some technical evidence found based on forensic reports of the portal about some abnormal activity, an offence could be registered. In the absence of that, it would be difficult to register an offence,” the officer said.

Coding, bots, and allegations of fraud

Vyas said that if BookMyShow claims that bots were used by portals to book tickets, they should have had measures like Captcha code to prevent it. Also, they should have reported it to the police the same day, he added.

“One of the prayers in my complaint is to allow access to BookMyShow’s digital footprint so that the police can find out what activity took place between 12 and 12.30 pm when the booking went live,” Vyas said.

“ I asked a cyber expert if it would be possible to do a cyber investigation and find out whether BookMyShow deliberately logged off people from their app and website at 12 noon on September 22 for 15 to 20 minutes for unlawful sale of Coldplay tickets to black marketeers. He confirmed that it can be done if he gets access to BookMyShow’s systems, their audit logs and price change mechanism,” Vyas said.

Apart from this, some social media users also claimed to have used coding to get into the BookMyShow website to get access to tickets even before they went live. An officer said that this too, if proved, could be taken as an offence if the right party approaches the police.

As the Mumbai police begin their probe, like Vyas, thousands of Coldplay fans deprived of tickets will be watching the investigation closely.