There are several aspects of Arul George Scaria’s book on Indian film piracy that have an immediate appeal. It is relatively short – around 200 pages minus appendices and bibliography. For a book that is scholarly and breaks new ground, this in itself is remarkable. It is eminently readable for the most part, written in an easy style and has an intriguing beginning, thereby piquing the reader’s interest. And it is all about a subject many are interested in, namely films in general, and, more particularly, the world’s largest producer of films, India. The book has many examples of both Indian and global film titles and personalities. For all these reasons I expect the book will have a wider readership than just the intellectual property community.

For the intellectual property community, to whom this review is addressed, I would commend the book for its careful scrutiny of the issues involved and insightful conclusions on actions that would help reduce piracy. Scaria has undertaken the ground-breaking task of carefully preparing, administering and evaluating a questionnaire to different groups of film viewers in India. The results of this survey are interesting in that, contrary to what is often portrayed in international forums, the problem is not one of awareness-raising about intellectual property piracy. Therefore, the solution does not lie in organizing more awareness-raising and capacity building workshops in developing countries like India. The majority of respondents, across the different categories, knew that piracy was illegal and that they were doing something wrong. Scaria rightly points out that there is a certain comfort in being part of the crowd where piracy is rampant. Additionally, there is a very low probability that there will be any kind of appropriate retribution for acts of piracy. In the Indian context where there are both supply-side problems due to the closure of the cheaper, single screen cinemas, and demand-side problems due to low purchasing power in the hands of more than one-third of the population, the problem of piracy becomes compounded. Yet, despite the book’s narrow focus, it is relevant not only for India and not only for film piracy. It holds lessons for other developing countries too where policymakers are looking for cost-effective solutions to piracy of a range of copyrighted cultural works.

The book is well structured. After a brief introductory chapter, it critically reviews in Chapter 2 various studies done to estimate film piracy in India. Scaria rightly points out that the common error made is to assume perfect substitution of one pirated film viewing for one cinema ticket. While he focuses on willingness to pay, I would add that the original and pirated copies of the same film are different products. Many times consumers are only willing to pay a lower price for what they anticipate to be a poor print and/or involve greater time and effort to stream or download. Scaria, however, rightly points out that Indians are prolific users of the Internet – next only to the US – and summary conclusions cannot be drawn from the numbers visiting only the film piracy websites. An important theoretical point made in this chapter is that piracy adversely affects price discrimination by the right owners under static conditions. In the long run, piracy affects many aspects of creating films, such as financing production through legitimate means, a particular difficulty in India.

Chapter 3 analyses India’s copyright law in its historical, cultural and legal contexts. From an international perspective, Scaria could have added that India was a founding party to the Berne Convention of 1886, being part of the UK in colonial times. British India then consciously decided to continue its adherence to the Berne Convention in 1928. After independence, India continued to strengthen its copyright law – even going Berne-plus, having implications with respect to films since the Indian film industry had taken firm roots by then. The latest amendments to copyright law in India show that the law is even TRIPS-plus in many aspects. The single criticism one might have of this chapter is that it is dense, and a reader not au fait with Indian law can get lost in the detail. It would have been well worth the effort, had the author pointed to the implications of the provisions for film piracy as he went along describing the relevant provisions and jurisprudence.

Chapters 4 and 5 constitute the heart of Scaria’s thesis already alluded to above. Chapter 4 contains an analysis of the data produced by the author on perceptions of film piracy. This is indeed remarkable, original and valuable work. Unfortunately, this chapter is difficult to read. The main reason is that the legal background of the author takes over, and in his efforts to be precise, he misses the forest for the trees. For example, there is no need in the text of this chapter to be precise up to two decimal points for every number in the tables in the appendices instead of drawing the big picture. The major finding of this chapter is that the majority of those surveyed consider it both morally and legally wrong as well as detrimental to society to engage in acts of piracy. However, a majority also acknowledge that the probability of getting caught or punished for such acts is low, if not negligible. Those from rural areas favoured piracy less than those from urban areas of India. My conclusion is that, contrary to expectation, students from the science and technology streams seem to be engaging in less piracy than students from the arts. The author does not explain this – perhaps those studying the arts had more leisure time to engage in the time-consuming acts of streaming and downloading of pirated films!

Based on the survey outcomes discussed above as well as interviews, Chapter 5 makes some sensible recommendations, notably on increasing enforcement efforts and reducing the punishment of proven infringers from mandatory imprisonment to deterrent fines. In addition, Scaria recommends that the supply-side constraints be removed by increasing the number of single screen cinemas that sell tickets at lower prices, and increased supply of reasonably priced DVDs/VCDs. With increasing access to broadband, consumers should also be able to use subscription services such as Netflix. Clearly, the high rates of film piracy in India show inter alia that there is unmet demand. While Scaria recommends price discrimination strategies, the discussion is inadequate and could have been expanded. For example, the idea that differential pricing can be based on location could have been explored further.

Overall, this is a book on film piracy that is grounded in real-world experiences and evidence. It is highly commended to all who should be interested in this subject, particularly policymakers in India and other developing countries.