Author name: Amlan Mohanty

Housing Finance Software Copyright Dispute

/ By / Copyright

This seems to be the season for disputes between competitors, with accusations of data theft and copyright infringement flying around from time to time. Soon after the Burrp-Zomato and Cleartrip-Travelocity disputes, we have another one to report, but this time in the context of housing finance software, with software firm Kensoft Infotech accusing Sundaram BNP Paribas Housing Finance (“Sundaram”) of fraudulent use, criminal breach of trust, hacking, reverse engineering and tampering of their software. In this instance, Kensoft Infotech had […]

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Creative Commons Licensing Success Stories: Pratham Books

/ By / Copyright

While we have in the past spoken about the dangers of an aggressive and severely restrictive copyright regime, we haven’t focussed enough attention on the use of alternative licensing mechanisms and the social benefit that accrues from such a practice.  For that reason, I will cover in this post, the efforts of Pratham Books, a non-profit children’s book publishing house and their persistent campaigns for openness and unrestricted access to content suitable for children’s books, by advocating the use of

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EU Extends Copyright Protection for Musical Works

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An issue that regularly features in copyright reform debates is the issue of extending copyright terms for different works.  I had blogged earlier about the proposed amendment to the Indian Copyright Act for extension of copyright terms for photographs and principal directors, expressing concerns about copyright term extension in general. While the Indian amendments might have to wait a while, the European Union has left little to the imagination by adopting a directive that extends the term of copyright from

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Radio Broadcasters Receive Favourable Treatment in Copyright Amendment Bill

/ By / Copyright

As members of the Rajya Sabha get set to debate the provisions of the Copyright (Amendment) Bill, 2010, there’s one issue that is sure to come up in the course of the discussions. With the HRD ministry narrowing the definition in S.31D (relating to statutory licensing) to include only ‘radio broadcast’ and excluding television broadcasts, television networks are up in arms and are expecting a reasonable explanation for the exclusion, when the bill is debated in parliament.  The earlier provision

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Guest Post: Factors Contributing to Orphan Works vis-a-vis a viable Option

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We are extremely pleased to bring to our readers a short piece by Nirajan Man Singh on orphan works and the viable alternatives for protection works from being orphaned, with a specific analysis of the Google Books settlement. Nirajan was a student of NALSAR University and then pursued his masters at UC Berkeley School of Law. This particular paper was written during his time at Berkley Law, under Professor Pamela Samuelson. You can read the entire paper on Nirajan’s SSRN

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SpicyIP Announcements: Call for Submissions – Special Issue on Dispute Settlement at the WTO

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The Editors of TL&D invite submission of unpublished, original works for publication in the forthcoming Special Issue of TL&D (vol.4, no.1 (2012)). The theme for the Special Issue is: Dispute Settlement at the World Trade Organization. Manuscripts received by 31st October, 2011 shall be considered for publication in the TL&D Special Issue on Dispute Settlement at the WTO. Submissions can be made online through our website, ExpressO, LexOpus, or by way of e-mail. Please see the submission guidelines, and in

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The Death of Safe Harbour for Intermediaries in India for Copyright Infringement? [Part II]

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Continuing from my previous post, in this post, I will cover the decision of the court in the case of MySpace v. Super Cassettes and its reasoning for the same. I will devote a section specifically to the issue of the interpretation of S.79 and S.81 of the IT Act which has a significant bearing on the immunity available to intermediaries for hosting content that infringes copyright. DECISION OF THE COURT I.                    Authorising infringement of works The court by making

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The Death of Safe Harbour for Intermediaries in India for Copyright Infringement?

/ By / Copyright

In this post, I will be covering the recent decision of the Delhi High Court in the case of Super Cassettes India Ltd. (SCIL) v. MySpace on the issue of intermediary liability for copyright infringement of works owned by SCIL (T-Series). For the discussion on the impact of this case on the liability of intermediaries in India for copyright infringement, you can go directly here. This was a decision that I, personally, have been eagerly awaiting since news of the

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IIM-Calcutta in a Copyright Mess Involving Educational Courses

/ By / Copyright

It appears that even renowned institutions such as IIM-Calcutta cannot escape the claws of the copyright regime, with a private college, WLC College India Ltd., accusing the former of ‘intellectual property theft’ in relation to course material that was provided to IIM-C during negotiations for a joint-certificate course.  It is reportedthat WLC is planning legal action against IIM-C for copying the structure and syllabi of a special course that was designed by them. WLC has argued that there is merit

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Injunction Order against Cleartrip for Data Theft Refused by Bombay High Court

/ By / Uncategorized

Quick recap: To quickly recapitulate the facts surrounding this order, one might remember the FIR that was filed against Cleartrip by Travelocity in late 2009. Travelocity is a foreign company that acquired Travelguru, who in turn had acquired Desiya (another online travel agency web portal) in 2007 for data theft.  Essentially, the charge was that Desiya employees, including former CEO of Desiya, Amit Taneja, had criminally conspired to hand over data belonging to its company to Cleartrip. This resulted in

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