Costliest TV Show: With A Budget Higher Than Prabhas’s 600 Crore Kalki 2898 AD, This Mythological Epic Series Cost 4.6 Crore Per Episode – Decoding Stats!
The costliest TV show was mounted on a budget that was 650 crore, higher than the budget of one of the costliest films Kalki 2898 AD.
Costliest TV Show On Indian Television Had A Budget Higher Than Kalki 2898 AD’s Budget! ( Photo Credit – SonyLiv, JioCinema, IMDb )
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Prabhas’s Kalki 2898 AD has already been the talk of the town due to its mind-spinning budget of 600 crore. But what if we tell you that a grand television series costs 50 crore more than this budget? Yes, you read that right. The costliest show that aired on Indian television was made on a budget of a whopping 650 crore.
This show was based on the epic Ramayana and is currently streams on Jio TV. It originally aired on Colors TV and was titled Ram Siya Ke Luv Kush. The story narrates the tales of the twin sons of Lord Rama and Devi Sita and depicts their years of growing up.
Himansh Soni played Ram on the show, and Shivya Pathania played Sita. Krish Chauhan and Harshit Kabra played the sons Luv and Kush. Bigg Boss star Shaleen Bhanot played Ravana in the series. Created by Swastik Productions, this epic mythological offering was mounted on a scale of 650 crore!
Ram Siya Ke Luv Kush aired from 2019 – 2020, and almost an unbelievable 4.6 crore per episode was spent on the making of the show. However, it had a dry run in TRPs and was unceremoniously taken off air after 141 episodes.
The lead pair of the show, Himanshu Soni and Shivya Pathania, were cast as eternal Radha and Krishna in a mythological offering from Star Bharat Radha Krishn. This show starred Sumedh Mudgalkar as young Krishna and Mallika Singh as Radha. The show was mounted on a budget of 150 crore and was very successful.
Another 650 Crore Saga?
Talking about the costliest Television serial, apart from Ram Siya Ke Luv Kush, another show is rumored to have the same budget, and it was Suryaputra Karn. While some reports suggest that the show was mounted on a scale of 650 crore as well, other reports say that the budget of this show was 250 crore. It starred Gautam Rode in the lead. The show was intended to be a finite 150-episode series, but due to high demand, it was extended to a total of 307 episodes.
Since major reports mention the budget of the show as 250 crore, we tried doing the math. A total of 8 lakh per episode would have cost a single episode for the show, which seems unreasonable for such a high-quality costume drama. A report by India Times suggests that the budget of Suryaputra Karn was indeed 650 crore, making the cost of a single episode somewhere around 2.1 crore!
Lessons For Kalki 2898 AD?
These two mythological epics can be such a case study for Prabhas’s Nag Ashwin film Kalki 2898 AD. One was based on Ramayana, and the other on Mahabharata. Reportedly, both serials were mounted on almost the same budget. However, while Ram Siya Ke Luv Kush tanked, Suryaputra Karna was loved and demanded.
Interestingly, Kalki, 2898 AD, which is set in a dystopian world, takes a major inspiration from Vishnu’s tenth avatar, Kalki. Hopefully, the film makes every penny of its 650-crore budget!
