Copyright violation puts Guruji CEO in jail

Anurag Dod, the CEO of the Bangalore-based, Sequoia Capital-funded search engine, Guruji.com, was arrested in Bangalore along with other top executives of the company on April 30, based on a copyright infringement complaint filed by T-Series..Anurag Dod [pictured], the Chief Executive Officer of the Bangalore-based, Sequoia Capital-funded search engine, Guruji.com, was arrested in Bangalore along with other top executives of the company on April 30, for alleged copyright infringement. T-Series, owned by Super Cassettes have filed a complaint against Guruji.com, alleging that the site streams the musical content owned by T-series for free..This is the one of the few times a CEO and the top management have been arrested for copyright violation. Counsel for T-Series, Rahul Ajatshatru said, “This was a criminal action taken by police upon examining the complaint and the infringing website. The police seized the equipment and also arrested some executives during the raid.”.T-Series has been fighting a series of copyright battles against companies that run online search engines, including Google, and several television channels like Zee TV..In February this year, six Google employees were arrested in Italy for a similar copyright infringement incident. Last year, Avnish Bajaj managed to obtain a stay over criminal proceedings over the sale of an obscene MMS clip on bazee.com by a user..The question on the culpability of the owner of a search engine or a domain for third party content, remains unanswered. The judgement will set a precedent for the interpretation of both the IT Act (Amended 2010), and eventually, the Copyright Bill which was introduced in Parliament a couple of weeks ago. One may argue that a website owner must be aware of what is being offered on his or her site and therefore is liable for any violations of law..Shamnad Basheer, Professor at National University of Juridical Sciences told Bar & Bench, “The whole idea of criminalizing an IP offence is ridiculous. We really need to revamp our IP laws because of the impact of these criminal cases? There is no damage to the society and the offences must be dealt on a purely civil basis. Also studies have shown that increased IP monitoring does not decrease IP offences. Especially in these times of economic uncertainty, there should be a balance between economic implications and upholding laws without one taking precedence over the other.”.Despite the outcome in the above case, it is imperative that general counsels of companies come up with strategies and ways to protect the CEO and the top management from IP related criminal lawsuits. It would seem that an amendment issuing clarity is necessary in this issue, considering the growing number of lawsuits filed by the entertainment industry in relation to copyright laws.