MUMBAI: The Alliance Against Copyright Theft (AACT), a coalition between Hollywood-Bollywood studios to fight the various forms of piracy in India, seized nearly 1,25,400 pirated DVDs/CDs in Mumbai and North India since August 2010 worth Rs 12.50 million (Rs 1.25 crore).
AACT continued its tactic of conducting strategic raids on movie pirates throughout the country and has made 71 arrests, confiscating more than 90,000 DVDs in Mumbai itself and 35,000 in Delhi-NCR & Punjab.
During August 2010, the coalition conducted more than 50 raids (close to two raids daily) and made 56 arrests in Mumbai. In the first week of the month, AACT seized close to 31,000 pirated DVDs and made 10 arrests. Pirated DVDs of I Hate Luv Storys, Once Upon A Time In Mumbai, Raajneeti, Raavan, Aisha, Lamhaa along with English movies like Toy Story, Inception, Salt, Predators, etc. were seized during the raids.
During September 2010 as well, pirated DVDs costing Rs 40 lakhs were seized from all over India. Close to 4000 pirated DVDs were apprehended from Mumbai, 22,800 from NCR & 12,600 from Punjab during the month. From Northern India & the Punjab region 8 DVD burners were seized and 15 arrests were made. Pirated DVDs included many popular English movies like X-Men, Scary movie part 1-4, etc.
In August, Maharashtra Home Minister RR Patil announced the formation of an Anti-piracy squad in next two months for video piracy. I&B Minister Ambika Soni have also given positive signals to have stricter laws for piracy. With a strong motive to curb piracy all over India, AACT has taken many such initiatives to meet its objectives.
Moser Baer CEO Harish Dayani said, “Initiatives taken by AACT in the past few months have been recognized by various Government Departments. In-fact recent announcements by Home Minister RR Patil & I&B Minister Ambika Soni to support AACT and curb piracy are very encouraging. We can now begin to see the results of our continuous enforcement raids; the number of stalls selling pirated movies has visibly reduced in several areas across cities. The toll free number has done wonders for AACT by involving the common man in the campaign against piracy.”
