Piracy menace continues to torment Indian cinema
Ever since the advent of video recorders over five decades ago, piracy of Indian films, which began with hotly circulated video cassettes, has grown by leaps and bounds. Keeping pace with technology, this worrisome trend for the badshahs of the country’s movie industry has morphed and re-engineered itself to eat away a significant portion of the box-office revenues of the handful of hit films over the years. As cyberspace expanded, dedicated websites that specialise in enabling downloading and streaming new movies within hours (at times, even before it formally finds its way into theatres) of its universal release have sprouted uncontrollably.
While concerned industry watchers lament about how it ends up as a free source of earnings for shady operators across the globe, the other side has rejoiced at the prospect of watching new releases without having to go through the arduous process of booking tickets, online and offline and spending a fortune additionally in movie halls on snacks and refreshments to enjoy their favourite fare. Once again, the government has moved in after entertainment industry representatives and research outfits of the transnational kind sounding the warning bell, urging them to take up stricter measures to control this menace.
As a PTI report said: In a bid to curb digital piracy, the government has amended laws to include jail term and strict fines of up to five per cent of the production cost for those involved in illegal recording and transmission of films. The government brought in these changes to the Cinematograph Act two years ago to strengthen the provisions against film piracy announced Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting L Murugan in Parliament last week. He said Section 6AA and 6AB of the Cinematograph Act prohibit unauthorised recording and transmission of films. “Newly added Section 7(1B)(ii) of the Cinematograph Act empowers the Government to issue necessary directions to intermediaries for hosting pirated content,” Murugan said. According to The Rob Report by EY and the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), the Indian entertainment industry faced a loss of Rs 22,400 crore in 2023, primarily due to piracy.
The film industry has changed drastically, notably in the new millennium with the explosion of multiplexes and introduction of a customised system of doing business, wherein the exhibitor and producer manage to make money on a pre-arranged sharing formula. This has also meant screening of films across multiple screens, protected with cyber security measures, yet seeing them pirated and plundered by a dedicated set of digital wolves who specialise in spoiling their success parties.
Rumours abound that those into this privacy racket have the backing of industry insiders, while a vicious, dog-eat-dog environment exists in the film world. It is not uncommon to hear whispers about how one powerful camp secretly enables these celluloid thieves to pirate ambitious productions of the other camp just to show them their place and keep alive the rivalry; all is fair in love and war. One should say, despite self-righteous protests by film associations and movie moguls, such mercenary, undercutting tactics will continue to be in vogue, with the government throwing the rule book at them and precious little thereafter.
