30,000 Duplicate NCERT Books For Rs 50 Lakh: Delhi Police Busts Piracy Syndicate

Delhi Police on Monday (18 March) arrested a 28-year-old man in east Delhi's Gazipur village for selling pirated NCERT books and recovered over 30,000 pirated NCERT books worth Rs 50 lakhs from his printing press, reports India Today.

The demand for the National Council for Education Research Training (NCERT) books has spiked following human resources development (HRD) ministry’s directive which made them mandatory for all CBSE-affiliated schools.

Recently it was reported that the HRD minister Prakash Javadekar had also expressed his displeasure against NCERT after complaints were received from students and parents over the shortage of school textbooks. Hence with NCERT unable to fill the demand-supply gap, an underground network had spawned.

Pan-India Network

With this arrest, the police authorities claim that they have busted a piracy syndicate which was in the business of printing and circulating NCERT books across the country.

Police allege that the owner of the printing press Abhishek Chaudhary alias Goldy used produced pirated NCERT books of Mathematics, Hindi, English, Economics, Chemistry, Hindi and History of classes 6 to 12.

Officers say that a large number of papers with the NCERT watermark and over 700 pirated books valued at Rs 50 lakh were recovered from the location. Chaudhary has been booked under the Copyright Act.

Also Read: NCERT Introduces ‘KYA’: Know Your Aptitude Exams Will Help Class IX, X Students In Making Career Choices, Says CBSE