With the arrest of a 28-year-old man, the Delhi Police on Monday busted a syndicate, allegedly involved in printing and circulating pirated National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) books on a large scale. Police have recovered huge quantity of books and semi-finished once worth Rs 50 lakhs from the printing unit of the accused which is situated at East Delhi's Ghazipur area.

 "The managements of the schools were allegedly getting hefty monetary benefits by the publishers in lieu of prescribing the books. After the Government's move, there was a sudden rise in demand for the NCERT books. Unscrupulous elements exploited the situation by getting printed pirated books and hooked in the sellers by offering them higher profit margin," said police.

The accused has been identified as Abhishek, a resident of Delhi's Shakarpur. According to Rajiv Ranjan, Additional Commissioner of Police, Crime Branch, specific inputs were received that an offset unit is publishing pirated NCERT books of class 6th to 12th standard of different subjects for the upcoming new Academic session.

"On March 12, a raid was conducted along with vigilance officer and production officer of NCERT on publishing unit where the entire setup was unearthed. The accused Abhishek was apprehended from the spot," said the Additional CP.

"During interrogation, the accused Abhishek revealed that after dropping during his studies, he started helping his father in his press. In the year 2017 he came in contact with one Rahul Jain who was also running an offset press. Rahul asked him for printing of some NCERT books title pages. He came to know through Rahul that there is huge profit in publishing of pirated NCERT books, as NCERT books are always in shortage," said the Additional CP.

"The accused established an offset press at village Ghazipur with the name of Kumar Offset and Abhishek Graphics and solely started publishing pirated NCERT books of 6th to 12th standard. He procures NCERT watermark paper from Chawri Bazar, Delhi. After preparation of complete set of books he distributes them to different parts of North and South India," the Additional CP.

"NCERT books due to its excellent quality have always been in huge demand. Further, the Ministry of Human Resource Department (MHRD) has made efforts to make NCERT books mandatory for CBSE affiliated schools. The Government move came amid allegations that several schools were allegedly compelling students to purchase costly books of private publishers", he said.

"Police have recovered more than 3500 printed books which were ready to be sold in market and around 700 unfinished books have been seized from the offset unit," said the Additional CP adding that further investigation is going on.