Imagine spending a considerable time writing a script, then hunting for producers to make it into a movie, and when the final product is ready to be released in cinemas it gets leaked on the web for illegal downloads! Won’t that dishearten you, make your blood boil, but also result in loss of revenue that you were hoping to generate after sweating it out for months on end?
This is what the Indian film industry has been facing for years and suffering losses to the tune of Rs 20,000 crore every year due to piracy.
Till now, no institutional mechanism was in place to directly take action on pirated content, except legal action under the Copyright Act and Indian Penal Code. The nodal officers have been appointed in the I&B ministry and offices of the Central Board of Film Certification headquarters in Mumbai and its regional offices in major film production centres.
The last significant amendments to the Cinematograph Act were made in 1984, nearly 40 years ago. The Act now has provisions against film piracy, including digital piracy. Pirates can now be punished with a minimum of three months imprisonment and a fine of Rs 3 lakh, which can be extended to three years imprisonment and fine up to 5% of the audited gross production cost.
Any original copyright holder or any person authorised by them can apply to the nodal officer to take down pirated content. For complaints raised by people who do not hold the copyright or are not authorised by the copyright holder, the nodal officer can hold hearings in each case to decide its genuineness before issuing directions.
After receiving directions from the nodal officer, the digital platform will have to remove internet links hosting pirated content within 48 hours.
Apart from issues relating to film certification, the amended Act includes the issue of unauthorised recording and exhibition of films and transmission of unauthorised film copies on the internet. These amendments are in direct correlation with film piracy being addressed by the Copyright Act, 1957 and the Information Technology Act, 2000.
The newly inserted Section 6AB of the Cinematograph Act, 1952 provides: “No person shall use or abet the use of an infringing copy of any film to exhibit to the public for profit at a place of exhibition which has not been licensed under this Act or the rules made thereunder; or in a manner that amounts to the infringement of copyright under the provisions of the Copyright Act, 1957 or any other law for the time being in force”.
Section 7(1B)(ii), which has been introduced in the amended Act, states that the government may take suitable action for removing/disabling access to the pirated content exhibited/hosted on an intermediary platform, which is in contravention to Section 6AB.
