Court grants three more days of custody of piracy accused

The Nampally court on Friday granted three days of custody of Emandi Ravi, the alleged mastermind of the iBomma and Bappam TV movie piracy network, in connection with multiple cyber crime cases. This is the third time Hyderabad Cyber Crime Police have been granted custodial access to question him.

According to the court order, the Cyber Crime Police will take Ravi into custody on Saturday, Monday and Tuesday. The court heard arguments from the police and accepted their request for custodial interrogation. It posted the bail petition filed by Ravi’s lawyers for further hearing on Monday.

Ravi, 39, was arrested on October 17 from an apartment in Kukatpally. Police said he ran a large piracy network through iBomma, Bappam TV and more than 65 mirror websites hosting newly released Telugu films in high definition. Investigators seized hard drives carrying nearly 21,000 films across languages and said he earned an estimated ₹20 crore from the operation, which he allegedly used to purchase flats and plots. About ₹3.5 crore in his bank accounts has been frozen.

According to officers, millions of users accessed pirated content through domains and mirror extensions managed by Ravi, causing heavy financial losses to producers and exhibitors. The network allegedly diverted users to illegal betting platforms, leading to large-scale data theft and financial fraud. Police said Ravi used servers abroad, rotating domains and more than 110 registered extensions to keep the sites running despite repeated blocks.

Two associates, web developer Duddela Shivajee and private employee Susarla Prashanth, were arrested in September. Ravi is also named in four other FIRs involving piracy, online cheating and data theft.

The seized material and digital evidence are under examination as the investigation continues.