Published By: Soham Halder

From Sold Out to Summoned: How the Coldplay Ticket Scandal Put BookMyShow's CEO in Trouble

Mumbai Police's Economic Offences Wing (EOW) summoned Ashish Hemrajani, CEO of Big Tree Entertainment (parent entity of BMS) for alleged black market sales of Coldplay concert tickets.

The highly-anticipated concert of Coldplay in Mumbai in January 2025 have been obfuscated over ticketing scams on the platform BookMyShow (BMS). More than 1.3 crore people have logged in to secure tickets while only 1.5 lakh were available. In an unprecedented way, all tickets were sold out within 30 minutes of the sale opening, leaving fans fuming over numerous issues like transperancy and efficiency of the ticketing process. After the complainants being lodged by Advocate Amit Vyas, Mumbai Police's EOW sent summons to Ashish Hemrajani alleging black marketing.

Reasons behind the Need for Investigation:

The original tickets sold by BMS were in the range of Rs 2,000 to Rs 35,000, which eventually reappeared on resale platforms including Viagogo at a significantly higher prices.

(Credit - X/@Sttyyx)

A fan took on social media to post that Rs 12,500 ticket being resold at Rs 3.36 lakh, approximately 2,700% higher price than the original. The lounge tickets (original price of Rs 35,000) were sold at a whopping Rs 10 lakh, a 30-fold hike. The similar resale strategy was observed on social media as well.

The scalpers saw an opportunity amidst unprecedented demand of Coldplay concert tickets. Through scalping strategy, tickets were bought at large quantities to resell them on third-party applications at a higher price. The scalpers used automation and bots giving a significant edge than other buyers. Eventually, the false sense of scarcity led to rise in ticket price.

Technical Glitches or Man-made Manipulation?

Several fans have raised concerns on social media about the queuing system. Fans experienced long virtual queues despite the first to get the ticket. This raised the suspicions of manipulation or man-made technical glitches hampering fair access for everybody.

Some fans even faced issues while completion of payment process, resulting into widespread criticism of BMS.

 

(Credit - X/@ANI)

BMS Clarifies Doubt:

A BookMyShow spokesperson clarified "We implemented a queueing system to manage the overwhelming demand and addressed issues, 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.”

BookMyShow also addressed the unauthorised sale of tickets mentioning: "Scalping and black marketing of tickets is strictly condemned and punishable by law in India and BookMyShow vehemently opposes this practice. We have not only filed a complaint with the police authorities but are also proactively working with them to provide complete support in the investigation of this matter in any manner that may be required. To our consumers, we would like to reiterate that any tickets bought from unauthorised sources will be at their own risk and may likely be invalid or fake tickets.”

 

(X/@coldplay)

The Mumbai police have asked the CEO to appear before the investigating officers for recording their statements. After the complainants, the first summon was issued for Sept. 27 which was skipped by the BMS CEO. Will BMS CEO attend the investigation or skip again?

The Coldplay concert is scheduled for January 19 to 21 at DY Patil Stadium.