“Globalisation, You have made me a priest!”

As Kerala Police continues their war against CD piracy, new behind-the-scenes stories are emerging thick and fast. One such story is that Moser Baer, the flagship CD manufacturing company of India in this era of globalisation, is behind this entire hullabaloo. Moser Baer is about to launch a new initiative of marketing CDs and DVDs of all films in future just after 15 days of their release. The company will garner the rights of all films that are going to be released in Malayalam. They do this by investing in the production of the movies. (According to some sources the company will bear 15% of the production cost of each film.) The proposed price of two CDs is Rs. 30/-. The new scenario, if everything takes place as planned, will give Moser Baer a monopoly in the million-rupee CD market. Also it will virtually ensure the closure of thousands of CD shops and libraries in Kerala. It is rumoured that Moser Baer’s influence in the higher echelons of Kerala government is the real reason behind the newly found vigour of Kerala Police to launch a massive drive against pirated CDs.

Mr. M.S. Ajaya Ghosh, a native of Varkala and a dealer of Idea mobile recharge cards, is said to have signed a deal with Moser Baer for marketing film CDs and DVDs in Chirayinkizh taluk in Kerala. The company has promised him a virtual monopoly of the market and a margin of Rs. 7 per film. He is a happy man, dreaming about the profit that he is going to make. While at the other end of the spectrum, there is Mr. G. Satheesh, who runs a video and CD library called Vinayaka Videos in a prime location in Attingal town in Kerala. He is from Brahmin community, but because of his love for films and film songs that started from his school days he ventured to start a cassette shop and library which slowly has become the number-one CD shop in Attingal, while his brothers decided to embrace their family tradition of becoming priests in temples. Then suddenly one day, the threats of police raids came along. He says that it is impossible to make profit by buying only the master CDs, which are priced at Rs. 199/-. He argues that one has to rent the CD 20 times at least to cover the expense. By that time, the CD will most probably become damaged because of rough usage. He says that either the price of original CD should come lower or pirated CDs should be allowed.

So where does the future of our moviemakers hang? After all, they claim that CD piracy is one of the reasons of people not coming to the theatre. For that question Satheesh gave me a scornful look. “If they make good films people will go to theatres. Pirated CDs had been easily available for the film Classmates. Despite that the film became a big hit. Why?” For that I didn’t have an answer. Anyway, Satheesh has decided to become a priest in a nearby temple, which incidentally is a very profitable job these days. So he can now safely declare in a Thoppil Bhasi-like manner that “Globalisation! You have made me a priest!”