A Swiss couple -- William Albin (58) and Loshair Lily Marty (57) -- charged with making child pornography films were sentenced to seven years' imprisonment by the sessions court in Mumbai on Saturday.

They were arrested on December 16, 2000 from The Resort, a five-star hotel in suburban Malad in Mumbai. When the police raided their room, the duo was shooting a pornographic film with street children.

Defence lawyers had earlier urged the judge to give them conditional bail considering their age and the fact that they were in jail for almost two years. However, their bail plea was rejected on two occasions.

The prosecution had alleged that the couple lured kids with money and attractive clothes to perform sexual acts before the camera. The movies were then sold abroad.

William and Loshair, according to the prosecution, had visited India and neighbouring Bangladesh and Sri Lanka on several occasions in the past 10 years.

The Swiss citizens, however, denied all allegations and claimed to have visited India only as tourists. They claimed that  they were falsely implicated and accused the police of digitally manipulating the seized pictures.