Draft Copyright (Amendment) Rules, 2019 | Govt plans changes in copyright rules to
improve content access
Date | 03 June 2019
In order to ensure smooth and
flawless compliance of Copyright Act in the light of technological advancement
in digital era and to bring them in parity with other relevant legislations,
the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade, Government of
India has now proposed to introduce the Copyright Amendment Rules,2019.
The draft rules are available on http://egazette.nic.in/WriteReadData/2019/204924.pdf
for seeking comments and suggestion from all persons likely to be affected
thereby up to 29th June 2019.
The copyright regime is governed
by the Copyright Act, 1957 and the Copyright Rules,2013. The Copyright
Rules,2013 were last amended in 2016 through the Copyright Amendment
Rules,2016.
Press Analysis –
Draft Rules
The draft rules allow all broadcasters to take advantage of statutory licence
provisions, a move that is expected to benefit a number of Internet-based
broadcasters.
India is looking to widen the copyright
framework, which is at present restricted to television and radio, to bring
all forms of broadcasters
including digital under its ambit.
The Department for Promotion of
Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) on Monday proposed the Copyright Amendment
Rules, 2019, and sought public comments and suggestions on the draft.
The draft rules seek to introduce
changes to the copyright framework in the light of technological advancement in
digital era and to bring them in parity with other relevant legislations.
They also allow all broadcasters
to take advantage of statutory licence provisions, a move that is expected to
benefit a number of Internet-based broadcasters.
"The thrust of the draft
amendments seem to be directed at the hot topics of statutory licences under
which shelter has been sought by internet broadcasting companies like Spotify, WYNK,
etc., and certain amendments which relate to functioning and transparency by
copyright societies," said Nishad Nadkarni, partner (intellectual property
team) at Khaitan & Co
Experts say this would enable
non-traditional broadcasters including web and IPTV to seek compulsory licence
of copyrighted content from a content owner, limited only to radio or TV
broadcasters right now.
"This means greater access
to content at potentially better rates and terms for Internet broadcasters
including Netflix,
Amazon Prime and Spotify," said Ankit Sahni, an expert on intellectual
property rights.
The latest draft also proposes to
replace the Copyright board with an appellate board.
It states that in case the
royalty due to an author and other copyright owners remains undistributed at
the end of the period of three years from the end of the financial year in
which collection of the royalty occurred, the copyright society shall refund
the amount to the licensee within a period of three months.
Separately, the government has
proposed amendments to the patent regime to bring clarity with respect to the
working requirement for a patented invention on a commercial scale in India.
Source | http://egazette.nic.in
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