Pirated Indian films flood British towns

LONDON: Apart from Asian porn DVDs being sold illegally, British authorities are grappling with a massive influx of pirated copies of Indian films that has affected revenue of several cinema halls in towns such as Leicester and Manchester.

 

In Leicester, the Sangam Cinema in the Asian-dominated Belgrave area is being forced to shut down due to poor collections. It is one of the four cinema halls in the town that exclusively screens the latest Indian films. In September, the Southall police and Ealing Council had uncovered an illegal DVD production factory and 50,000 counterfeit DVDs after officers of Trading Standards raided an address in Southall. According to the British Phonographic Industry, it was one of the biggest seizures to date of CD and DVD burners in Western Europe. However, industry sources believe that there were many more such sources in Britain.

 

The manager of the Sangam cinema in Belgrave Gate, Jagir Singh Nehra, told the media that it would close down very shortly because daily collections had come down to as low as 40 pounds. “Last year we were putting on five shows a day and getting 200 people at each show, now it is just two shows at a weekend with hardly anybody there. We cannot go on,” said Nehra.

 

The cinema charged 1.20 pounds admission for adults and 50 pence for children, but pirate video recordings of the same films can be obtained for as little as 80 pence in some cases. During the September raid in Southall, three people present at the address were arrested on suspicion of infringing the Trademarks Act 1994 and the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

 

Meanwhile, Eastern Eye, a leading British Asian weekly, reported that pornographic material from South Asia was being sold in markets frequented by people from the Indian sub-continent.