SICGIL, Co-Soft fined Rs 2.5 lakh

BSA and NASSCOM announced a court settlement with Chennai-based SICGIL India

Limited and Co-soft India Limited.

Under the terms of the settlement, which has been filed with the Delhi High

Court, the companies have given a written apology to BSA and NASSCOM and also

agreed to cease using unlicensed software on their computers. The two companies

have acknowledged the intellectual property rights of BSA and NASSCOM member

companies and admitted infringing these rights in the past.

Civil raids were conducted at the premises of SICGIL and Co-soft in December

2001, leading to seizure of 12 PCs, carrying illegal unlicensed software and

also two pirated CDs.

The settlement includes damages of Rs 2.5 lakh, complete legalization of

software used by the company, removal of all unlicensed/pirated software and

submission to an unannounced audit of computer systems during the next 12

months.

Use of pirated software, in addition to being a civil wrong under the

Copyright Act, is also a criminal offense and is punishable with imprisonment of

up to three years, and fine of up to Rs 2 lakh.

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