New Delhi, May 9: Data storage device manufacturers in India are pressuring the government to tighten rules on video piracy – a major lacuna in the Information Technology Act. The heightened pressure comes at a time when the US has retained India on its priority watch list under the Special 301 for inadequate laws to protect copyright infringement.

Optical media is defined as a processing device that performs various functions by manipulations of electronic, magnetic or optical impulses. CD, DVD, floppy drive, hard disk drive and memory stick are examples of storage devices.

This is a Rs 400-crore industry in India and is projected to become a Rs 1,500-crore industry by 2005. In India, Moser Baer, Seagate, Sony, IBM and Samsung are the leaders on optical storage devices controlling 90 per cent of the market.

Pavan Duggal, an expert on cyber law and IT-related issues, says, “By targeting private production of optical media, the US wants to stop piracy and increase intellectual property right (IPR) regimes and its ambit. The US manufacturers who want to enter India are sceptical about the strength of the existing laws to control the piracy of optical storage devices.”

India does not have strong IPRs like in the US. Even with existing laws it would not be possible for the Indian government to stop piracy. The Information Technology Act does not even take this issue into consideration.

“The act is silent on the issues of IPR in electronic medium and does not talk about privacy and piracy. This is one of the major setbacks of the Information Technology Act, despite the fact that the law aims to legalise the e-commerce and related aspects and activities,” said Duggal.

The US government has identified countries like India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Russia, Thailand, Lithuania and Ukraine that have failed to aggressively enforce anti-piracy laws. “We continue to urge our trading partners facing the threat of pirated optical media production within their borders to enforce similar controls,” says the US report on Intellectual Property Protection.

Vinne Mehata, secretary general of MAIT, the apex organisation of IT hardware manufacturers, agrees. “We have to move forward. The ministry of information technology has decided that the Information Technology Act has to be amended.”