Copyright and its History

 Copyright and its History

Copyright is the document that gives protection to the original work of the authorship. Any author puts in a large amount of time in developing his work, it involves a lot of research and imagination. . This showcases that it becomes very important for the author to preserve these documents from any copying of the work. The copyright includes books, poems, blog posts, movies, architectural work, plays computer programs, recordings, etc.

In copyright, everyone is the copyright owner, once an original work is created by the author and the owner. The ownership is made by the works made for the hire, it states that the work made by the employee within the scope of employment is owned by the employer.  This doctrine also applies to certain independent contractor relationships for certain types of commissioned works. 

The history of copyright in India dates back to 1847 which was established during the East India company's regime. According to the 1847 enactment, the term of copyright was for the lifetime of the author and 7 years post mortem.  It should also be kept in mind that this period can not exceed forty- two years in this era it was seen that compulsory license was also granted, compulsory license is given to the owner of the copyright, upon the death of the author, refused to allow its publication. 

In 1914, the Indian legislature has enacted a new copyright act. This act extends to most portions of the united kingdom copyrights of 1911 to India. In this act there were a few amendments to this act which includes criminal sanctions for copyright infringement (sections 7 to 12) .second modification was introduced to modify the scope of the term of the copyright under section 4 the 'sole right 'of the author to" produce, reproduce perform or publish a translation of the work shall subsist only for ten years from the date of the first publication of the work .'

Before the act of 1957, copyright was governed by the copyright act 1914, which was an extension of the British copyright act, of 1911. The act was further amended in any years, like in 1983, 1984,1992,1994, and 1999.  In 2012, both houses passed the copyright amendment bill.

Their various amendments, in the act 2012 listed as, amendments to rights in artistic works, cinematograph films, and sound recordings, in this the amendments were made to clarify the rights in artistic works, cinematograph films, and sound recordings.  It provided the right to reproduce an artistic work, to make a copy of cinematography.

The second major amendment was related to WCT and WPPT, article 11 of the TRIPS agreement, Article 7 of WCT, and Article 9 of WPPT are to provide for ' commercial rental 'rights. Section 14 (d)and (e) concerning cinematograph film and sound recording respectively were replaced with the term " commercial rental". Section 18, through amendment act 2012, provides that the author of a literary or musical work. There were various other amendments such as grant of compulsory licenses, grant of statutory licenses, administration of copyright law societies, fair use, etc.   Not just section 53 and section 11 were also amended.