Rishi said the family decided to sell the property after learning that the renovation of the studio would still not bring in enough revenue to keep the establishment running. “For a while, we did juggle with the idea of renovating the place with state-of-the-art technology. However, in reality it isn’t always possible for a phoenix to rise from the ashes. We Kapoors are very emotional lot but then… The investment in rebuilding the studio would just not have yielded sufficient revenue to keep it going. Believe me, we had to take the larger picture into account and take a level-headed decision. Even before the fire, for years R. K. Studio had become a huge white elephant, toting up losses. The few bookings we would get from films, TV serials and ad shoots would expect free parking space, air-conditioning and discounts,” he told the daily.
A portion of the Kapoor family’s iconic RK Films And Studios caught fire in September 2017. “A studio can be built again but the loss of the irreplaceable memorabilia and costumes of all RK Films, is tragic for all. Fire took it away,” tweeted Rishi, son of the studio’s founder, the legendary Raj Kapoor.
R.K. Studio, the headquarters of the film production company R.K. Films, was founded and named after the Great Showman, Raj Kapoor, in 1948. Its inaugural banner film Aag that year crashed at the box office, but the next year proved to be a good omen when its production "Barsaat" (1949), starring Raj Kapoor-Nargis was a super hit. In fact, the company's logo was designed to reflect the poster of a scene from Barsaat and after that, the studio never looked back. It had a string of successful black-and-white releases like Awaara (1951), Boot Polish (1954), Shri 420 (1955), Jaagte Raho (1956).
Later, the studio was the venue for several other big-ticket films like Jis Desh Me Ganga Behti Hain (1960), Mera Naam Joker (1970), Bobby (1973), the debut film for Rishi Kapoor and Dimple Kapadia, Satyam Shivam Sundaram (1978), Prem Rog (1982), Ram Teri Ganga Maili (1985), which was the founder-actor's last film before his death in June 1988.