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Increased international pressure seems to be forcing the Pakistani authorities into taking action against piracy and copyright violations.
In a surprise raid in Karachi last week, Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) recovered over 100,000 DVD copies of Indian movies and twice as many blank CDs from an illegal replication plant.
The facility was sealed and the owner and manager of the plant taken into custody.
But industry insiders remain deeply cynical regarding the prospects of such action becoming more common place or effective in the foreseeable future.
At best, they say, pirated English movies may start drying up over a period of time but there is no chance of a similar fate being in store for Indian movies.
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For years Pakistanis had not been able to see Indian movies at the cinema because of the hostile relations between the two countries in the aftermath of their 1965 war.
Now they suddenly found the latest Indian stuff available at corner shops for overnight rentals that rarely exceeded half a dollar.
So why didn’t the authorities clamp down on the pirated Indian video tapes?
<snip>
The cultural policy that allowed pirated Indian movies to proliferate also had political connotations.
"I am sure that at some level, allowing piracy of Indian films was considered a smart act of industrial sabotage by the Pakistani policy makers," says Ameed Riaz, the head of EMI Pakistan.
"Basically, anything that hurt India was considered kosher."
It is no coincidence that the first – little noticed – copyright law adopted in Pakistan in 1962 expressly stated that it did not cover Indian intellectual property.
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Just one more piece of proof supporting the animosity between the two countries.
