Posted by All Information Here on Friday, October 23, 2015
The latest copyright amendments enacted by Parliament requires “that the business of isuing or granting license in respect of literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works incorporated in a cinematograph films or sound recordings shall be carried out only through a copyright society duly registered under this Act”. The provision therefore aims at ensuring that all music companies, including T-Series which used to previously operate independently of copyright societies, are also forced to operate within a copyright society.
Strangely the law does not prescribe any sanctions for music labels which refuse to comply with this provision of law. What happens if T-Series and other music labels continue to operate outside the purview of any copyright society? What can the Registrar of Copyrights do about it? Presumably nothing!
But let us presume that even companies like T-Series are willing to function within a copyright society, it would be interesting to see whether they are going to function within the existing copyright societies or will they form their own copyright societies.
Currently the Copyright Act has a proviso which states “Provided that the Central Government shall not ordinarily register more than one copyright society to do business in respect of the same class of works.” The wording of the provision is no way mandatory and the Government certainly has the leeway to register more than one copyright society in the same category.
Should the government allow for more than one society in a certain segment? I think the Government should just process applications for how many ever copyright societies that it gets without trying to creating a super-copyright society which functions like a draconian monopoly. If companies like T-Series do not want to be part of a copyright society known to be in the control of certain thugs, they should not be forced to do.
From a consumer perspective, having more than one copyright society is always better as the competition between multiple copyright societies will keep in check any abusive behaviour by either one of the two societies.
This issue of multiple copyright societies is all the more importance for South Indian music labels. Given that the market and the players for South Indian music is distinct from Bollywood, should the member companies of the South Indian Music Companies Association (SIMCA) be forced to be a part of either IPRS or PPL when in all likelihood they will always be in a minority with no effective say in the functioning of either copyright society. Isn’t it better for these music companies to just form their own copyright society? Should the government be putting spokes in the process? I hope not.