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This is an archive article published on June 11, 2025
‘Karan Johar will still have creative control’: Adar Poonawalla reveals Dharma’s future plans, says ‘it’s all about having the right budgets, not overspending’
Adar Poonawalla, who owns a 50% stake in Dharma Productions, opened up about his plans for the company's future, and said that they will launch a music label and penetrate smaller towns.
Adar Poonawalla had bought 50% stake in Karan Johar's Dharma Productions.
Serum Institute of India’s Adar Poonawalla, who recently bought a 50% stake in Dharma Productions, opened up about scaling the business up. He said that creative control will remain in Karan Johar’s hands, and that they want to open a music label in the near future, while attempting to penetrate smaller towns in India. Adar Poonawalla entered the business for Rs 1,000 crore, and said in a recent interview with journalist Barkha Dutt on MojoStory that he’d known Karan for over a decade. “We’re quite well aligned, and it was easy for us to partner,” he said.
He continued, “The reason I did it was that I felt our ability to tell stories, to show the world what’s happening in our nation, and bringing to light what would have been missed, he’s very good at doing that. He’s told a lot of emotional stories in movies on family, on romance. It’s also a soft power, and it gives you access to people you wouldn’t normally come across… It’s a very interesting space, and don’t forget, we’re very under-penetrated today. People will start watching films on pay-per-view, if you start looking at the data… The penetration of our screens is just 15 or 20%.”
Adar said that Karan will have creative control, but that he has the freedom to chime in with creative inputs from time to time. “Traditionally, it was theatres, then came OTT. I think it can further penetrate in the rural areas, where business will do well… It’s all about having the right budgets for films, and not overspending… One of our understandings was that Karan will have full creative freedom. We’re building other verticals of distribution, like a music label that he’s working on. Increasing production of content is also the name of the game.”
In a recent interview with Bollywood Hungama, Karan highlighted the ‘herd mentality’ of the film industry as one of the biggest reasons why movies aren’t doing as well as they used to. “We see Pushpa running and catering so strongly to the tier two and tier three audiences. Suddenly there’ll be 20 others wanting to do the same. You see Chhaava working, and everybody will want to make historical dramas. After Stree, everybody wants to make horror comedies. Those worked because they were individually strong, and there was no other option in that genre. And it was a unique thought that made those films work. We all have individual thoughts that are unique to ourselves,” he said.
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