Delhi Police nabs man running online book piracy network, issues notices to 5 others
Delhi Police nabs man running online book piracy network, issues notices to 5 others
New Delhi, An organised online book piracy network was busted in the national capital with the arrest of its alleged operator, the Delhi Police said on Thursday as it issued notices to five others linked to the racket.
Anmol Kiro , a resident of Mayur Vihar Phase-I, allegedly operated the network through a website and sold pirated academic books across the country, they said.
The network operated by giving the appearance of legitimacy through an online storefront, using digital payment systems, creating auto-generated invoices, sourcing pirated material from street vendors, and dispatching orders across India via courier services.
Printing and plate-making work was outsourced to separate units to avoid detection, they said.
The probe began after an FIR was registered on November 3 under charges related to cheating and relevant provisions of the Copyright Act. Technical surveillance of the website led the police to the alleged operator, Kiro, a senior police officer said.
A raid at Kiro’s residence resulted in the recovery of 42 pirated academic books of reputed publishers, the police said.
It was found that Kiro created an e-commerce platform “BookBhandar.in” and a linked social media account, and used a bank account in the name of “Finskool Education” to receive payments, the officer added.
He allegedly sourced pirated books from Daryaganj and shipped them pan-India through couriers.
During questioning, Kiro revealed the larger supply chain.
A follow-up raid at Ganesh Nagar, Pandav Nagar, led to the recovery of 18 different titles totalling 686 pirated books, which were subsequently seized and deposited in the police malkhana.
The police issued notices to four people linked to the network Sunil Kumar Gupta from whose premises the 686 books were seized; Lalan Gupta, who allegedly received payments from the sale of the books; Naved, who is suspected to be a key supplier of pirated material, and Kamran , who runs a printing press in Hauz Qazi and from where a printing machine was seized.
Another man, Hilal Mohammad , was also served notice after police found him preparing printing plates used for the pirated books. Three such plates were seized from him, the police said.
The action was taken as part of the Delhi Police's ongoing crackdown on cyber-enabled economic offences and copyright violations.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
