NEW DELHI: Karnataka police has registered a first information report (FIR) against Belgaum’s only multi-system operator, Riddhi Vision which is a joint venture of InCable, for illegal transmission of copyrighted content.

The action was taken on a written complaint filed by Cable Star Copyrights Investigations, who is the distributor for Cable TV Rights all over India of Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited (Zeel). 

Karnataka police took cognizance under Section 37, 51, 52(A), 63, 68(A) of the Copyright Act for telecasting of the Hindi film ‘Khalnayak’ starring Sanjay Dutt and Madhuri Dixit on 20 July evening in Belgaum. The FIR was filed against the managing director and other directors of Riddhi Vision by Dr Chandragupt, superintendent of police in Belgaum. A spokesperson for Cable Star Copyrights Investigations told indiantelevision.com that the pirated content for which the rights were with Zee was being shown on the local channel run by the MSO.  

The spokesperson added, “It has been a practice of various cable operators to run content and specially movies without obtaining permission from the content owners, and the industry has been demanding strict action.”

He said Cable Star Copyrights Investigations is working for anti-piracy and distribution of Zee and other similar companies and has been a crusader against such piracy for several years and have previously lodged many such FIRs in various states.

He said, “Such blatant transmission causes immense loss of revenue to the content owners and government. Cable Star Copyrights Investigations has also lodged many complaints against big cable operators in Maharashtra and other states, in which they are pressing for swift and strict action. Such police action would definitely be a right step towards stopping the menace of piracy, which has been the bane of entertainment industry.”