Microdramas bring major woes for writers: Rs 1,000 pay, punishing deadlines, unclear contracts

Sulagna Chatterjee

"Microdramas are the new thing," buzzes every corner of the industry today.

From homes to locals and metros, one can hear smartphones buzzing with short snippets of stories aka microdramas. But behind the boom is quietly emerging a concern that paints the same old story: the exploitation of screenwriters. Poor pay, punishing deadlines, and unclear contracts continue to haunt many, particularly newcomers, expected to churn out 60-90 minutes of content in less than a week.

Believing it needs urgent attention, screenwriter Sulagna Chatterjee, who herself has been writing microdramas for a few months now, has decided to take the issue up with the Screenwriters Association (SWA) through her group, Women Film Circuit (WFC). "Last August, I put up a post about it because the microdrama space is extremely exploitative. People are paid Rs 1,000-2,000 to create a 90 minute content. Some sort of regulation is needed. The post went viral and many writers identified with it. But nothing happened after that. Later, I asked one of my friends, who works with SWA, about what we need to do to get a conversation started around this. So I learnt that we needed to formalise a proper letter to be sent to the Joint Secretary, the Vice President and the President of SWA. Once it reaches them, they're forced to take it up, at least in the committee meeting," Chaterjee tells mid-day.

The WFC is collecting inputs from writers working in the microdrama space to accompany the formal letter to the SWA in two parts-- Anonymous Experience form, which will document the pay ranges, timelines and recurring patterns of the producers and Signatory Form that will feature signatures of the writers comfortable to lend their names to the letter.

"I put up a social media post about it because this space is extremely exploitative. People are paid Rs 1000-2,000 per episode. Some sort of regulation is needed. The post went viral and many writers identified with it. But nothing happened after that," Chatterjee tells mid-day.

"We have 30 responses for the anonymous experience form so far. 70 per cent of them actually have gotten paid less than Rs 50,000 to write the entire show. 23 per cent has gotten 50,000 to 75,000. There's nobody who has gotten more than 1.5 Lakh at all, There is maybe one per cent which has gotten between 1 to 1.5 lakh," Chaterjee shares.

The writer says there's a lot of shame attached to writing for microdramas, which are seen more as a means to survive than a creative choice by the writers.

"This is an apparent new normal of the industry, where no new work is being commissioned. There's a loss of hope felt by the writers. Microdramas have become a way of survival for writers. There's a lot of shame attached to it. People talk about writing for micros in a hushed manner. They are also despondent, thinking what can they even do."

For writers' pay to improve, the production budgets need to be reworked, Chaterjee says. "If Rs 15 lakhs is your production budget, how much will you give to the writer? The scary part is this kind of budget ranging from Rs 13-15 lakhs for a 60-minute long content is being normalised. The tech brands have a lot of money, but there are also independent producers in the vertical storytelling space because it's low stakes-high return. (So), the budgets are horrendous."

Writers aren't being short-changed only financially, but also devalued as creatives, considering they are given a few days to a week to write the dramas. "The timelines are a big factor. There's barely any clarity or transparency during talks. Everybody is experimenting and the ones who are getting the most exhausted are the writers because for a show I got six days to turn around 50 episodes of one and a half minutes each. So from your beat sheets of 50 episodes to the screenplays of 50 episodes, all of that in six days. And when you ask them to give you 10 days, they say, 'Nobody gets 10 days!'"

Out of 30 responses for the anonymous experience form so far:

Writers got paid less than Rs 50,000 to write the entire show - 70%
Between Rs 50,000 to 75,000 - 23%
More than Rs 1.5 lakh at all: 0% - 0%
Those who got between Rs 1 to 1.5 lakh - 1%

Micro shows that went viral in 2025

>> ‘Gold Digger Kahin Ki' (Story TV app)
>> ‘Trials & Reposts' (Instagram)
>> ‘Shaitan Haveli' (Story TV app)

Sulagna Chatterjee is known for writing:

>> Amazon Mini TV show ‘Adulting' (2018)
>> ‘Firsts' for Dice Media (2020)
>> A segment of Netflix's anthology ‘Feels Like Ishq' (2021)