City cops raid office of corporate in Chennai over ‘IPR violation’

“We went ahead with the raids once the Madras High Court gave an order in our favour. Computers and hard disks have been seized,” said Additional Commissioner of Police (Crime) Niket Kaushik.

The case pertains to an FIR registered in 2010 with the Mumbai Police’s Cyber Cell,after Virendra Singh,the owner of a software company,Kensoft Infotech Ltd,alleged that Sundaram BNP Paribas HF,its MD Srinivas Acharya and four senior management hacked,reverse engineered and tampered with a software developed by the firm,thus committing an IPR fraud.

A 1992 home finance software — KEN-HFS — designed and developed by Kensoft,was supplied to Sundaram BNP Paribas on a user licence for seven years. Singh claimed that Sundaram BNP Paribas HF tampered with the software in 2008. To a query he asked,he was told in a “cold email” in December 2008 that Sundaram was the new owner of the code as they had developed the product.

With the matter initially “studied and researched” by IIT-Bombay faculty,the Mumbai Police Crime branch began probing the criminal angle in 2011. After studying the report prepared by two IIT-Bombay professors,Mumbai Police Crime Branch had been trying to take the mirror images of the sever in Chennai since 2011,said senior officials.

In August 2011,the company challenged the territorial and subject jurisdiction of the Mumbai Crime Branch to register an FIR and probe the matter. On January 22,the Madras High Court dismissed the company’s appeal to quash the FIR and gave a verdict in favour of Mumbai Crime Branch and Crime Branch’s Cyber Cell,both of whom were respondents in the case. The judgment states that the Mumbai Crime Branch has a statutory right to probe the matter and no one can intervene and take that away.

“The raid is a big move. It also gains significance as big companies are usually careful in subjects like IPR,” said Karuna Jain,co-ordinator,IPR Cell,Professor of Technology and Operations Management,SJMSOM,IIT Bombay. Jain was involved in studying the Intellecutal Property legalities. “We studied it in detail at IIT and were convinced that a fraud had been committed.” Jain’s report is one of the documents the Mumbai Crime Branch relied upon.

“I usually do not consult IT companies and look only into matters involving the end-user. In this case,I took a different view as this case was important,” said Professor D B Phatak,head of Kanwal Rekhi School of Information Technology,IIT Bombay. Phatak even visited the office of Sundaram Paribas to apprise them of their alleged mistake early in 2010.

“I have read the legal papers. The code was licensed to them for seven years. They used for that long and when the time to renew it came,they called it their own. This case is important for many reasons,mostly for the manner in which Kensoft is fighting against a big corporate,” said Jain.

A NASSCOM official helping the Mumbai Police said,“The delay that the corporate has shown in co-operating with police is a sign that they have a role to play.”

“This case also points at how the IP agreements can be interpreted. Kensoft’s papers were perfect,still the company misinterpreted the words claiming that it is their product. We handle big corporates on a regular basis and now advise them that words like turnkey and others are not to be misinterpreted. The probe will set a precedent in such matters,” said R M Sonar,associate professor of Information from IIT Bombay (currently on lien to his company Iken Solutions).

A spokesperson from Sundaram Infotech said,“While dismissing our appeal questioning the jurisdiction of Mumbai Police,Madras High Court directed Mumbai Police to appoint another investigating officer to go into the case afresh. They have since appointed another investigating officer,who visited our office and recorded the statements of our officials. We have also given them copies of the softwares for forensic test to establish whether the new software is a copy of the old one. We have given them enough documents to support our case. The documents include report of Anna University certifying that the new software is not a copy.”

“The complainant deliberately did not file the report of Anna University,a copy of which was available with them while filing complaint. They misled the police by filing only a copy of report of professors of IIT Bombay given in their individual capacity. IIT Bombay have confirmed that they do not give such reports officially. The IIT Bombay professors gave the report without visiting Chennai to look at the softwares. Their opinion is based on the information provided by the complainant,” the spokesperson added.

“There is no way the IIT professors at Mumbai could have had access to the new software. The company officials will visit Mumbai next week to record their statements”,the spokesperson said.