Copyright Amendment Bill deferred amidst differences

The controversial Copyright (Amendment) Bill was deferred for consideration by the Union Cabinet at its meeting here on Thursday amid differences between HRD and I&B ministries over some of its provisions, sources said.

The legislation was expected to get the Cabinet nod today after factoring in recommendations by stakeholders and parliamentarians.

The amendments to the Copyright Bill was supposed to drop the controversial statutory licensing clause for radio broadcast.

The amendment to the Copyright Act, 1958, aim at according unassignable rights to ‘creative artists’ such as lyricists, playback singers, music directors, film directors, dialogue writers who will be paid royalty every time the movie they have worked in is aired on a television channel.

The Bill has run into a series of difficulties with clauses challenged by the film industry, book publishers and broadcasting industry.

The legislation was opposed in Parliament in the last session over the statutory licencing for radio broadcast of literary and musical works.

Sources said differences persisted on the Bill and hence it was deferred. It is expected to be brought back to the Cabinet again after further fine tuning.