Bengali music industry wants Goonda Act to tackle piracy

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SME Times News Bureau | 22 Jun, 2013
The Bengali music industry wants the West Bengal government to introduce the Goonda Act and include music piracy as a major offence.

The Eastern India Music and Home Video Producers Association is set to meet Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and urge several steps including the introduction of the Goonda Act to to prevent piracy.

"Of all the music sales, 60 percent is through digital means, while the rest 40 percent is through physical forms like CDs, DVDs. With innumerable spurious web sites offering free music downloads, it is almost impossible to curb piracy until and unless we have exhaustive and stringent cyber laws," says D.S. Lahiri of Asha Audio.

"If states like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala can use the Goonda Act to tackle video and music piracy, why can't we have the same law here? If the government can help curb physical piracy, it will help us at least to survive," said Shashikant Gathani of Gathani Records.

According to the audio companies, sales up have come down by 70 percent due to piracy.

Along with stringent laws, it is also necessary that the industry is made aware of the relevant intellectual property laws.

"If we don't care about our own creations, then who will? To fight piracy, it is essential that we all are aware of the relevant laws and use them to protect our creations. We need to use the Copyright Act extensively," said film producer Shubojit Roy.

The industry will also seek from the government strong cyber laws to tackle digital piracy as well as a legislation making it compulsory for FM channels to seek permission from licensing authorities with a reasonable revenue sharing for playing music.