In a bold move, the Modi government has made up its mind in terms of tackling the menace of film piracy. According to a new notification, the Union Cabinet has approved amendments to the Cinematograph Act, in order to crack down hard on film piracy.
To quote the order, “ To check piracy, particularly the release of pirated versions of films on the internet, which causes huge losses to the film industry and the exchequer, the government has proposed to make film piracy offences punishable with imprisonment of up to three years and fines that may extend to Rs 10 lakh or both.”
This is not all. According to an official press release regarding the same, this amendment will also “increase industry revenues, boost job creation, fulfill important objectives of India’s National Intellectual Property policy and will give relief against piracy and infringing content online.”
This decision was much needed since piracy is something that has hit the interests hard for not only the filmmakers but also the theatre distributors. Since the advent of digital media, film piracy has increased manifold, with several films being leaked online either before release or soon after the release, causing a major dent to the collections of the same. From Udta Punjab to Mohalla Assi, Sarkar, Petta, Maari 2 etc., almost the entire Indian film industry, irrespective of ethnicity, has been plagued by piracy.
To combat this menace recently, the makers of ‘URI’ uploaded an entirely fake copy on torrent, with a message against film piracy.
This had a huge impact on their collections, as, despite the film being ultimately leaked on illegal site Tamilrockers, the collections just don’t seem to go down. As of now, the movie, despite the leak, has earned more than 200 crores domestically and is on the way to script history with more than 300 crores from worldwide collections
As such, the crackdown of the Modi government on film piracy is nothing less than a breath of fresh air for the producers and the film distributors, whose business thrives on the theatrical collections. Also, this serves as a tough message for those, who think that they can indulge in film piracy and get away with it.
