The Hindu : New Delhi News : Harry Potter pirated; 3 held

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 02, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

Harry Potter pirated; 3 held

Staff Reporter

8000 fake copies, machinery worth Rs. 1.4 crores recovered

THE PIRATES: Sitting in the front row are the accused Rajeev Tomar, Vipin and Mahinder Gupta, arrested by the North East district police for printing pirated copies of J.K. Rowling's `Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince', in New Delhi on Monday. Photo: Anu Pushkarna

NEW DELHI: Three persons allegedly involved with printing pirated copies of J.K. Rowling's "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince'' were arrested at Shahdara in North-East Delhi on Sunday. The police have recovered 8,000 copies of the book along with printing machinery worth Rs. 1.4 crores from their possession.

Acting on information that pirated copies of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince'' was being printed in Durgapuri extension, a police team raided the premise and caught Rajeev Tomar, the owner of the printing press, red-handed printing the book along with his workers.

During the search, the team found material for 2,700 books along with a printing machine, cutting machine and aluminium printing sheets.

Rajeev Tomar after sustained interrogation revealed that the printed material was to be sent to Mohan Book Binding House located in Uttar Pradesh. He further disclosed that he had an associate Vipin Mehta, of Shahdara, who was in possession of a number of cover-pages of the book. The police raided his house and recovered 850 coloured cover pages of the book. Vipin has also been arrested.

Further interrogations revealed that two other persons, Vikky Malhotra and Kedar Nath Gupta, suppliers of the books, were also allegedly involved in the piracy network.

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