Saptaswara Chakraborty| North Eastern Hill University| 4th July 2020
Introduction
Plagiarism, as has always been known, is the stealing of someone else’s work. The word Plagiarism as is known today is preferable ” the process or practice using another person’s ideas or work and pretending that it is your own”. However, now the idea of Plagiarism broadly can be said as anything that is seen as an unethical and unattributed use of another’s original creation can be defined as Plagiarism. Plagiarism can be of various types, including the idea that the supposed plagiarized material contains. Plagiarism in films is a long drawn affair with several films batting or filing suits against the other so-called plagiarized films. While copyright and Plagiarism are often taken to be synonymous, copyright rather constitutes a bundle of laws under which the party that holds such a right is protected.
Films and their association to Plagiarism
Often, while challenging in the courts of films being plagiarized, it can be found that the idea often is treated to be Plagiarism free. What is taken into account is rather how the idea has been executed and expressed. If a considerable similarity is found, then such an entity is considered to have violated the copyright laws and the rather performed an act which is unethical. Copyright infringement occurs when first there is access to one’s work and that there has been a substantial similarity of expression between the works. The widely popular and one of the iconic song of the 70s “Mehbooba” of Sholay is a copied version of the song Say You Love Me by Demis Rousso’s.
Similarly, moving to the west, the long-drawn controversy of Disney’s Simba from the movie “The Lion King” (1994) and a much somewhat older version of it Kimba- The White Lion (1960) has for long been an issue of lengthy debate. Recently the movie Raabta was also drawn into the court with a copyright infringement suit by the producers of the Telegu film Magadheera. Both were having a similar plot and twists. The suit was then withdrawn under Order 23 Rule1of the Civil Procedure Code as both the parties agreed to an out of court settlement.
Plagiarism and what constitutes it
Plagiarism in India is extremely difficult to prove as the Supreme Court believes that concept as such ideas, subjects, themes, plots and facts cannot be copyrighted and that similarities are unavoidable in two works that are dealing with or similar to the same idea/subject. The only way through which it can be proved to be plagiarized only if it is a representation very much similar to that of the original except for a few variations.
In the case of R.G. Anand v M/S Deluxe Films and Ors(AIR 1978 SC 1613)[3], the plaintiff accused the defendant of copying his drama “Hum Hindustani” in the defendant’s movie “New Delhi”. The court had applied the Lay Observer test which meant that if the reader or the spectator or both found after having read or seen both the works of a clear impression that the following work appears to be a copy of the original one, then that would be considered of having been plagiarized. However, the judges after a discussion that the film of the defendant to be different from the original one. The judges further went on to say that an idea, principle theme on the subject being a shared property cannot be the subject matter of copyright of a particular person.
Convention Relating to the Subject
Under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 27(2), it states that everyone has a right to the protection of the moral and the material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author. Mostly there are two critical conventions on the copyright of protection of which India is a part.
- Berne Convention for protection of the literary and artistic works, 1886[6]
- Universal Copyright Convention, 1952[7]
The above-mentioned Convention provides for the protection to the literary and artistic works without a prerequisite “registration”. Every country under the Convention must have a national law and policy that adheres to the laws that have been fixed by the Convention.
Copyright infringement in the Indian Cinema and its laws
The Copyright Act, 1957 makes copyright a cognizable offence, and if found someone violating it, the violators can be jailed for up to three years and be asked to pay a fine between Rs. 50,000 and Rs. 2 lakhs. Various remedies such as a warning, settlement of the damages and the cost of legal proceedings with the original creator. In recent times Bollywood has been increasingly accused of copyright cases because of the remake of films and what many call as “inspiration” from the Hollywood films. Bollywood is infamous for its unlicensed copying of films and of which the Hollywood for long was not even aware of. In the year 2010, a successful suit was filed by the Twentieth Century against Sohail Maklai Entertainment for the unlawful copying of the 2002 thriller Phone Booth into Knock Out. The Bombay High Court awarded Twentieth Century injunctive relief until Sohail Maklai could pay 340,000 dollars in damages
Conclusion
With the increase in the number of cases of content being copied, there arises an urgent need for India to provide statutory laws that protect the intellectual property of the owners and provide protection against such unethical practices.
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