Kaththi: Five important clarifications from Lyca Productions

In the Press Meet held today on Kaththi, the makers wanted to clarify the 5 issues that revolve around this much-anticipated film!

Issue 1

Images showing Lycamobiles logo in the background of the Sri Lankan Government sponsored Common Wealth Business forum was morphed. The first article with these morphed pictures which appeared in a website in an attempt to mislead the public. Lyca productions clarified that the Lyca Group representation in Srilanka for the forum was only as a business participant – one among the several who participated. The Lyca Productions team has also lodged a complaint with the cyber-crime division in Chennai, and a copy of the compliment was also shared with the media.

Issue 2

A second set of images appeared in the same website some months later showing the chairman of the Lyca Group getting off a Srilankan military helicopter. This helicopter was hired by the Lyca Mobile from Helitours, a company providing chartering service of inactive military helicopters, a service available to anyone. Lyca Group had to use the Helitours services as it was the only way to travel around Srilanka within a short time. The Lyca Group team had gone to around Srilanka a that time to survey the areas and to understand the problems faced by the tamil people and to create appropriate programs for their rehabilitation. The picture was used completely out-of-context in the website creating by vested interests to create confusion.

Issue 3

Lyca Fly, an airline ticketing company and a registered member of IATA, with a license to sell airline tickets of 240 airlines around the world Sri Lankan Airlines is one among the many airlines which Lyca Fly is contracted to offer to the public. This benign and normal matter has also been used wrongly with the media by the same group trying to create issues against the group.

Issue 4

Among the various charities done by the Lyca Group, is a donation given to the British Asian Trust, a charitable trust run by Prince Charles. For this trust, Lyca Group has committed One Million Pounds, of which an initial installment cheque of GBP 250,000 was given to Mr. Muttiah Muralitharan, the chosen ambasssador to accept the cheque given by the British Asian Trust. The photograph of this cheque handover was misused in the media by using wrong contexts.

Issue 5

In another incident Mr. Chris Tooley’s image has been connected to Mr. Rajapakshe’s son in a charitable ‘walk’ organized by cricketer Mr. Ian Botham. The event titled ‘Beefy’s Charity Walk’ has been held in several countries since 2010 and the walk held in Srilanka also had several cricket veterans like Mr. Sunil Gavaskar and Mr. Sourav Ganguly participating. By merely showing two personalities, Mr. Tooley and Mr. Rajapakshe’s son, running together, the picture attempted to tarnish the image of the Lyca Group.