How English movie makers are deceived in South Asia?

by Srabanti Majumder
May 21, 2010

http://www.weeklyblitz.net/745/how-english-movie-makers-are-deceived-in-south

For example, a film named Avatar is now running in various theater halls in South Asia along with other cinema halls in the world. Surprisingly, the producers and distributors of this film will not receive the sales proceeds from a large number of cinema halls in South Asian countries just for a simple trick of fraud practiced by the film distribution companies in India.

Once a print of any foreign film arrives in India, the importer immediately makes multiple copies of this film, through a technique called 'Tube' and then sells the illegally made copies of the film to various under-ground or even known cine distribution companies in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Maldives and other smaller nations. The racket takes one-time payment for the illegally made print from their potential customers, who would ultimately run the movies in various theaters in the mentioned countries. In most cases, those fraud rings even provide fake copies of agreement as well as other documents required for obtaining censor certificate from the countries concerned, thus helping the buyer of the illegal print in running the movie in the theater hall.

In some cases, even those illegal prints are broadcast in satellite based television channels in Asia without the knowledge and consent of the producers and distributors of the film. In almost all cases, DVDs and VCDs of the film are made in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Thailand, Malaysia and other countries illegally and sold almost openly in the market. Right after release of any movie in any of the Western countries, the racket manages a copy of the DVD thus finally making thousands of copies from it and illegally sells the same in the market, without minimum hassle from the law enforcing agencies or anti-Piracy team.

Commenting on this situation, Qamarul Hassan Bably, manager of Bangladeshi cine distribution and production company, Vibgyor Films said, "this is a very bad situation prevailing in the cine distribution business. We are trying to establish contacts with the film production and distribution companies in United States, Europe, Australia and the West with the goal of lawfully showing their movies in local cinema halls as well as helping them in combating piracy of the films both on DVD as well as on Tube format."

"A huge racket is already engaged in this illegal practice of unlawfully copying foreign films thus selling it to under-ground distribution companies or to DVD piracy gangs", he said.

Once a Hollywood movie would be released in India, in most cases, illegal copies of the same will be made almost simultaneously and distributed amongst thousands of small and medium cinema halls in that country as well smuggled to neighboring countries like Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka etc.

A number of Bangladeshi film distribution companies became losers by importing English movies from the authorized distributors, as almost simultaneously pirated version of the same film was smuggled inside Bangladesh from India and shown into various cinema halls in the country.

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