The e-Intelligence agencies here have noticed that the pirated print of Bollywood movie “Udta Punjab” was being downloaded in significant numbers in Bahawalpur in Pakistan, headquarters of the banned terror group Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM).
Even before the movie’s release, at least 350 downloads of the film were noticed on Friday, mostly from the posh Circular Road area in Bahawalpur where JeM chief Maulana Masood Azhar resides. Azhar runs a number of radical seminaries in Bahawalpur and some top retired bureaucrats and those from the Army and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) too reside on Circular Road, Intelligence sources said.
The agencies here are now probing the possible link between the Indian piracy network and State as well as non-State interests in Pakistan. Indian films are generally not allowed to be screened in Pakistan. The discreet inquiries will also seek to ascertain if the print of the movie was leaked by film processing laboratories in lieu of money or whether the same was done at the behest of the underworld, the sources said.
Underworld don Dawood Ibrahim who now stays in Pakistan under the patronage of ISI also has considerable stakes in the infotainment sector in India and his possible role in leakage of the film on the Internet is also under the scanner.
The agencies suspect the movie could have been procured by the inimical forces and uploaded on the Internet through some proxy server based in a third country.
The pirated movie was also available online in India and the Bombay High Court had on Thursday restrained the cable TV operators and Internet service providers from airing or circulating pirated copies of the film.
“The brains behind those uploading the movie on the Internet could be aiming to mint money by charging for the downloads and simultaneously hit the Bollywood and the State exchequer here by squeezing their due revenue,” an official said.
The unusual popularity of the movie in Bahawalpur could also be due to the fact that terror groups like the JeM often scan movies to seek ideas for furthering their jehadi and terror funding agendas.
According to reviews, the film Udta Punjab seeks to articulate the bitter truth about the reality of substance abuse in Punjab and its causes.
State and non-State actors of Pakistan are behind the drugs supply syndicate involved in Punjab (India).