Punjabi shows resume shooting after three months

After Punjabi music videos, a

Punjabi TV channel

has also resumed shooting for all new episodes in Mohali near Chandigarh. The new episodes will start airing from July 13 onwards. The shooting which resumed on July 6 was discontinued for a day on July 7 to sanitise the shooting sets thoroughly "to ensure they follow all protocols laid out by both, the central and Punjab government to stay safe in the pandemic," says a source from the sets.
Assuring their contribution towards the safety of their cast and crew,

Rahul Rao

, business head of the channel says, "The safety of our cast and crew is of utmost importance, and as a responsible broadcaster, we are going that extra mile to ensure we safeguard the interest of all artists and technicians across our sets. We were getting requests from viewers, who are now bored watching the older content, to start airing new episodes.”
The sets are sanitised after every two hours, all of the crew members, including the director and camera people, are wearing masks. The makeup artists are wearing face shields to ensure safety while being in close proximity to the actors during the time of touching up their faces with makeup. Among the actors who have returned to the sets for their shoot sequence are singer and actor, Sara Gurpal and

Amaninder Pal Singh

from the show, '

Heer Ranjha

'.
While Punjabi TV and music videos have resumed shooting, films are yet to announce their shooting schedule. “Film units take lot of manpower and equipment. Figuring out how to shoot with fewer manpower as prescribed by the

govt SOPs

, is a tough task for a film unit. And sanitizing equipment is also daunting since there is too much of it,” says the source.
Meanwhile, there is news from the govt on resuming film production. Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Prakash Javadekar, on July 7 said, “In view of the epidemic, the government will release the Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) of film shooting in India to speed up the resumption of film production which has so far been stalled due to COVID.”