On 23 November, the parliamentary standing committee tabled its report on the Copyright Amendment Bill, 2010. The bill proposes to amend the existing Copyright Act, 1957, in an effort to remove operational difficulties and also provide greater benefits to authors, lyricists, directors, composers, singers and other rights holders. The bill also proposes certain amendments to help curb piracy and update the law in view of technological developments.
It is important to note that parliament is not bound by these recommendations and has not taken any action with regard to the report yet. Some of the highlights are summed up as follows:
• The report rejects the amendment to grant the “principal director” and “producer” joint authorship and ownership rights on a cinematographic film particularly because there may be multiple directors involved. The practice of providing a director with authorship/ownership rights is uncommon in India or elsewhere. The report also acknowledges that this amendment would be unfair towards producers, since they invest in and take on all the equity risks in films, while the contracts and rights of each director are negotiated individually.
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The legislative and regulatory update is compiled by Nishith Desai Associates, a Mumbai-based law firm. The authors can be contacted at nishith@nishithdesai.com. Readers should not act on the basis of this information without seeking professional legal advice.
