Kerala Police bust film piracy racket, five members arrested

File photo (PTI)

New Delhi: The anti-piracy cell of Kerala Police on Wednesday busted a racket involved in releasing the pirated copies of recent released films. The police arrested five people from Tamil Nadu, belonging to piracy websites - Tamilrockers.com and DVD rockers.

The police also recovered laptops, hard disks and other gadgets used for piracy from their possession.

All the five accused were brought to Thiruvananthapuram and produced before a local court after which they were remanded to judicial custody. 

As per a report in The New Minute, the accused have been found to have made more than Rs one crore through the film piracy. 

Meanwhile, the police suspect the involvement of more people in the racket. 

The arrests were made after a probe, which went on for several months, to track down the members of both the groups. 

Speaking to The News Minute, anti-piracy cell SP Prasanthan said that an email that a Haryana-based advertising firm that used to canvas ads for popular websites. The firm wrote an email to one of the accused, who was arrested in 2016 in a similar case that led the police to the racket. 

The police claimed that all the accused are young and academically qualified and some of them even hold degrees in MSc and BSc in computer science.  

"They used to record movies in pieces from various parts of the world and join it. We are trying to trace more members of the gang including Karthi’s brothers," Prasanathan said. 

Several complaints have been registered against them in Kerala. As per Indian Express, DVD rockers leaked the Malayalam hit Ramaleela starring Dileep within a few days of release while Tamilrockers allegedly leaking the Mohanlal hit film Pulimurugan online. The latter is also believed to be behind the leak of Pranav Mohanlal’s debut film Aadhi.