Search for tickets for the Coldplay Music of the Spheres World Tour concert in Mumbai has created a lot of buzz on the internet. Fans across the country were waiting in queue for hours and still were unable to secure the tickets which sold out rapidly.
This resulted in causing a lot of frustration amongst Netizens and highlighted a debate around the growing class divide in the country. Author Chetan Bhagat and BharatPe co-founder Ashneer Grover joined the conversation on the internet as well.
In a post on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, Bhagat questioned the need to spend so much in the name of entertainment. The author, famous for his novels such as 2 States and Five Point Someone, asked, “On one hand we get figures of Indian salary percentiles and on the other there’s near mania for concert tickets. Who’s paying so much and buying all these tickets? What percentage of your monthly salary are people spending on these tickets? Some YOLO logic here? What?”
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Responding to the same, Grover acknowledged that disparity exists in the country, however, pointed out that a large proportion of the population has money to go overseas and continue their education in a foreign country. “It’s a large country - and lot is disparity on either end - why is filling of 80k stadium surprising anyone ? 800k students go overseas every year - spending $50K on an average. Also now that most people who can afford have phones - things will fill up instantly as well,” he argued.
However, users pointed out that education was an investment, but going to a concert was a lifestyle choice. One of the users even said that majority of the tickets were priced in the range of Rs 2,500 to Rs 6,000. "For a Urban(Mumbai)crowd, this is not exbortinantly high price People end up paying 2k for a dinner/ 1k for a 20km uber People have lesser creative avenues/experience to splurge," a user noted.