With the five-month-long crackdown partially crippling the functioning of the piracy racket in the State, the State Anti-Piracy Cell (APC)is going in for the final kill. If sources in the APC can be believed, the cell has begun drafting plans to launch a massive raid on Beemapally shops once the top echelons give the go-ahead.
“We have made deep inroads into the piracy racket. With our constant involvement, we have succeeded in paralysing the working of the racket to an extent. We believe more than 50 per cent of the illegal business has ended and the rest 50 per cent needs to be purged. Once the Crime Branch ADGP Vinson M Paul returns from abroad, we will take a decision on the raid. His presence will help to prevent any law and order issue arising out of the raid,” an officer in the cell revealed.
The raid, which is expected to wipe off the existing tentacles of the piracy racket, would be held before Ramzan. But this schedule is tentative as the APC had earlier postponed the decision to raid the thriving CD bazaars before Uroos, the main festival at Beemapally. At that time, the officers of the APC had heeded to the advice of the Jama-at committee to postpone the raid as any police action during Uroos or before that might flare up communal passions. The same dilemma is again preventing the APC from taking any action before Ramzan.
“Any forceful raid in the area will provoke the people. Our lone solace is that the Jama-at committee is with us. After we sensitised them of the seriousness of the situation in the beginning, they have been helping us in all possible ways,” said APC DySP S Rafeek.
He said that the vigilance maintained by the law-abiding citizens and the APC have resulted in the nose-diving of the activities of the piracy gangs. “Currently, large-scale operations have been suspended by the piracy rackets of Beemapally. As the APC has tightened the noose around online pirates, the offenders have now returned to the tactics that they resorted to in their incipient stage: buy a master DVD of the recently released film and then make hundreds of copies from it,” the DySP said.