COVID may shut colonial-era cinema in India’s Himalayan town

Shahi Theatre is last surviving single-screen cinema in Shimla in the Himalayas, once a summer retreat of British India.

With its ancient humming projector and elegant balcony, the Shahi Theatre is the last surviving single-screen cinema in Shimla, the Himalayan hill station that was once the summer retreat of British India. But like many other once-teeming movie houses across the country that were already struggling to stay afloat, the pandemic may be the final death knell for the century-old picture house. It was originally built as a theatre in British times, when the entire colonial administration would decamp from the blistering summer heat of the plains for the cool mountain climate further north.