Abids Police Arrest Four Men For Selling Pirated Books On Tilak Road

The Abids police busted an alleged book piracy racket on Sunday, July 12, 2026, arresting four individuals who were selling counterfeit copies of popular books from roadside stalls on Tilak Road near Bata X Road in Abids, Hyderabad. The arrests have disrupted an illegal operation that was allegedly deceiving local book retailers and readers.

The four arrested men have been identified by the police as Mohammed Sayeed Ul Hassan, Syed Farooq Ali, Mohammed Ajaz Ali, and Mohd Abdul Razzaq. All four suspects were operating the roadside stalls in the Abids area, where they offered duplicate prints of popular titles to the public.

The police action was initiated after a formal complaint was filed by Kaleem Ahmed, who is the authorised representative of Penguin Random House India. Ahmed approached the local police to report that the suspects were actively selling duplicate copies of books from several prominent publishers without any legal authorization or rights.

According to the police complaint, the counterfeit stock included titles belonging to major publishing companies, specifically Penguin Random House India, Hay House Publishers (India), and Simon and Schuster Publishers India. The pirated books were being sold at wholesale rates to attract buyers, passing the counterfeits off as genuine publications.

The unauthorized sale of these duplicate books not only misled unsuspecting retail store owners and individual customers but also caused substantial financial losses to the original publishing houses. The stalls near the Bata X Road junction had become a source of cheap, illegal prints that undermined legitimate book sales in the city.

Following the representative's complaint, the Abids police registered a case against the four accused individuals. The suspects face charges under Section 318(4) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) along with Section 63 of the Copyright Act, 1957.

The police have shut down the roadside operations on Tilak Road, and officials stated that further investigation into the racket is currently underway to trace the origin of the counterfeit books.