Vendors sell pirated CDs openly on Fridays

PIRATED CDs ranging in content from Bollywood movies to pornography are sold open at the park on Grand Hamad Street in the Al Ghanem area on Fridays, despite the best efforts of the authorities to curb the malpractice.

A Nepalese vendor who had hundreds of CDs spread out on a sheet of cloth – with a crowd trying to make the “right choice” – offered this correspondent “the latest and freshest content from South Asia.”

A wide range of CDs, VCDs, and DVDs featuring Indian movies, Pakistani stage dances, video clips of songs and even porn from South Asia were on sale in the open area opposite Alfardan Centre. CDs containing songs only were also available.

Copyright Department officials had conducted raids and taken some people into custody after Gulf Times published two reports last year (the first on May 23 and the second on May 27) about the sale of the pirated cassettes in Doha.

“The office has nabbed several Asians living in Industrial Area for violating the intellectual property right. They use their PCs to copy the programmes and CDs and sell them,” the official had said after the crackdown.

The price of the cassettes ranges from QR2 to QR10 depending on the quality of the CD. Most sellers are organised to an extent that they have files with listing of CDs on sale for potential buyers and if a title is not listed, they promise to provide it the next week.

The trade is aimed at thousands of industrial workers who throng the area stretching from the National showroom to the Central bus terminal.

It is learn that most of the Indian movies on sale were obtained from video retail outlets by making a legal purchase and then copying them on personal computers. The pornographic material, however, is got with the help of people who manage to sneak it through customs while entering the country, sources said.

The Copyright Department, which comes under the Ministry of Economy and Commerce, is closed on Fridays like other government offices and the limited staff under their disposal might be finding it difficult to cope with the pressure of the task.

Qatar, a signatory to international agreements on copyrights, has been taking steps to protect copyrighted material in the country.

Another vendor whose stock was sold out promised this correspondent to bring “latest movies next week at the same spot”.

The sale of these VCDs and DVDs starts at 10am on Fridays when workers gather in the area to spend the off day. Most of the vendors claimed that they sell CDs to make extra money to go with the meagre salaries that they get paid as labourers.

A long time buyer of these CDs expressed his ‘satisfaction’ and ‘highly recommended’ some to others.

“Where else can you get a movie for QR4! It’s simply a bargain. Sometimes the poor quality of the CD renders it unusable but for this price, I’d gladly take the risk,” he said.