A Guide on Fair Use Cases in India
Pankhuri Agarwal
Here’s the initial and the second installment of a compilation of all the fair use decisions pronounced by India’s high courts and the Supreme Court under the Copyright Act, 1957 till date (the pdf version can be viewed here and the word version here):
The compilation lists all types of use of copyrighted works which the courts have determined to be permissible – or not permissible – under Section 52 of the Act. The compilation also lists the relevant legal provisions, case details and the main points of court’s reasoning in respect of each type of use.
The initial installment compiled the decisions relating to education and research (e.g. course packs, guide books, question papers etc.) The second installment compiles decisions relating to use of copyrighted songs (e.g. for purposes of TV broadcasting, internet broadcasting/online streaming, festival related events or religious/marriage ceremonies).
Huge thanks to Bhavik Shukla (a former long-term intern at the blog, who’s now an Associate at Khaitan & Co.) for helping compile this list!
Hope that the readers find this resource useful. It can be easily accessed anytime from the Resources section (here). We’ll keep updating the list periodically.
While we’ve have tried to create an exhaustive list, please let us know if we have missed out any cases and we’ll add them to the list. Hope to bring to you the entire compilation soon!