The anti-piracy cell of the Kerala police has intensified inspections at mobile phone shops following a rise in the number of complaints related to illegal copying and trade of copyright-protected films and songs.
The squad members will team up with local police stations across Kerala to carry out inspections at all shops under suspicion.
Police sources hinted that the majority of new complaints were related to the suspected foul play of mobile shop owners from the Malabar region. Several memory cards and computer hard disks were seized from shops in various parts of north Kerala, they said.
As per preliminary investigations, a majority of the seized hard disks and memory cards contained newly released Malayalam movies. A large number of pornographic clips were retrieved from electronic items seized from various shops.
Police officers from Thamarassery station said the anti-piracy squad had arrested two mobile shop owners from the area last week. They were detained following a tip-off received by the anti-piracy cell’s head P.B. Rajeev, the police added.
From the Balussery police station limit too, two mobile phone traders were arrested by the anti-piracy squad. The computers used for copying films, pen drives and memory cards were seized during the arrest. The traders, in the piracy business for long, had managed to evade police scrutiny till now.
A senior officer attached to the anti-piracy cell said the team arrested 15 mobile shop owners from various parts of Kerala last week on the charges of violating the Copyright Act. A majority of those arrested were from Malappuram, Thrissur and Kozhikode districts, he added.
