Raj Kundra conducted all business via WhatsApp: Cops

Raj Kundra was the admin of three different WhatsApp groups where he discussed content, casting, payment, copyrights, piracy, and several other matters related to porn films. Representation pic

Further investigation into the racket revealed that businessman Raj Kundra had a legal team for copyrights to protect the porn films against piracy on Hotshots app, Crime Branch officers said on Wednesday. According to the Crime Branch, Kundra had also created three WhatsApp groups where he assigned tasks to the people.

The names of his WhatsApp groups were HS-account, HS-operation and HS-take down, said officers. In the HS-account group, he discussed content, subscriber, payment, transaction and porn business in relation to monetary profit.

In the HS-operation group, he discussed the kind of porn that was to be shot; how and where to shoot; whom to cast and their payment; editing of porn films; final content and final print. They used to send File Transfer Protocol or link to UK-based Viaan Industries Ltd, officers said.

The third group, HS-take down, was important as work related to monitoring of copyright and piracy was discussed here. If any of their porn movies on Hotshots app were found to be uploaded by any other porn sites or app, legal notice for blocking the content as well as a warning of legal action was sent. Discussions were also held about demanding compensation from the website or app that lifted the content, officers added.

Also read: Mumbai Crime Branch officers took Rs 25 lakh from Raj Kundra and demanded I pay up too: Accused

A Crime Branch officer told mid-day, "Investigation has revealed that Kundra used to handle work through WhatsApp groups as well. The important fact is that he was the admin and operational head of all these three groups." Kundra, who was arrested on Monday, had started his porn business about a year-and-a-half ago and made crores of rupees. He had planned to start a porn hub with the help of the London-based Kenrin Limited, a company owned by his brother-in-law, Pradeep Bakshi.

The Mumbai Crime Branch on Wednesday raided Kundra's Andheri office in connection with the pornography racket, and believed to have recovered a server which is suspected to have been used to transfer pornographic videos to the UK-based company, owned by his brother-in-law.