Syndicate of the Press of the University of Cambridge on Behalf of The Chancellor, Masters and School & Ors v/s B.D. Bhandari and Ors.
Facts-
The facts of the case are that the appellants had a publication of book called the "Advance English Grammar by Martin Hewings", the subject matter herein, which has been prescribed by Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Punjab for the students of B.A. Part I, II, III. The appeal of the appellants is that the respondents are publishing and selling books, which do contain illegal and unauthorized copy of literary content of the grammar exercises and keys of the appellants' publication and appellant against such unauthorized copy of their work filed a suit in the court asking the court to order respondent to stop selling books published by them which contains the original work of appellant and the learned single judge held that there was no originality or invention displayed in composing grammar sentences or exercises and hence the appellant's work does not constitute original literary, dramatic, or artistic works and also that the work of appellant comes under public domain and that the respondent is protected under section 52(1)(h) of Indian Copyright Act which provides the doctrine of fair dealing also at that this stage in suit in the the written statements filed by respondents they nowhere had contested the copyright of the appellant and they said that they were providing key to students and that there were certain structural changed between the work of,
Against such order of learned single bench the appellant filed the present appeal and the 3 main issue that court has to deal in that is:-
(i) Whether the appellants' work in composing grammar sentences and
exercises constitute original literary work or not and consequently there
subsists any copyright in the appellant's work or not?
(ii) If there subsists any copyright, then whether the prescription by
the University, in the light of facts and circumstances of the present case,
has an eroding effect on this copyright vested in the appellant?
(iii) If not, or up to a certain extent yes, then whether the work of
the respondent in publishing the guides amounts to infringement of the
appellant's copyright over the aforementioned English Grammar book.
Issue 1 :-
The learned single judge held that composing grammar sentences and
exercises constitute does not constitute original work and thus copyright
cannot be granted to the same.
In the present appeal the respondents on this issue appealed that the Indian copyright law had shifted from “sweat of the brow doctrine” which means copyright on works merely because time, energy, skill and labour to “modicum of creativity” which means originality of skill and labour and cited the case of Eastern Book Company v. D.B. Modak and they contended the copyright of appellant which they had not contented in their written statement during the trial of learned single judge.
The appellants contended that the work of appellant is result of years of research, knowledge, experience, creativity, labour, skill and ingenuity and that the author had used different methods to teach students that is unique and the appellant contended that the copyright law is not concerned with the originality of idea but that of the expression and the expressions employed by the author in drafting and arranging exercises and keys thereto are unique to the author and in their support the appellants cited these cases(i) Educational testing Service Vs. John Katzman Federal; (ii)V. Govindam Vs. E.M. Gopalkrishna Kone and Another;(iii) University of London Press Ltd. Vs. University tutorial Press Ltd.(iv) R.G. Anand Vs. Delux Films.
The court held that section 13(i) of copyright act protects original
literary work of authors and also saw the definition of originality used in
black’s law dictionary which states that originality means the quality or state
of being the product of independent creation and having a minimum degree of
creativity and the court held that test of originality in India is same as in
the UK which is based on the "skill, judgment and labour" and that in
the present case court studied the unit 36 from the publication of appellant’s
book and held that the exercises in the book of appellants depict originality,
as it has originated from the author and satisfies the test of "skill,
judgment and labour" and held that there is copyright of appellant on the
exercises contained in the book
Issue 2 :-
The second was based on the context of fair use and public domain where the learned single judge in its decision held that there exists no copyright of appellant as the work of appellant was falling in public domain respondent can copy it for fair use as given in section 52(1)(h) of the copyright act. The contention from appellant was that learned single judge used two different concepts that is public domain and fair use and was wrong in doing so.
The appellant first described public domain and the contention of appellant was that if its work is in public domain then according to law it had no copyright protection available and thus there was no need for this appeal but according to appellants there work does not fall in public domain and explained public domain as creative materials" that are not protected by intellectual property laws such as copyright, trademark or patent laws the respondents also cited the black’s law dictionary definition of public domain and they said that there are three common ways by which a work comes under public domain that is :-
(I) No copyright protection available
(II) Dedication(Relinquishment of copyright)
(III) Expiration of copyright
According to court , it held that for the 1st condition of public domain that is no protection available the court held that the appellants had copyright for their work as per section 13 of ICA which was discussed at length during issue one so their work is protected under section 14 ICA
For the second issue that is expiration of copyright, the court held that there was enough time left for expiration of copyright of appellant, so this way also does not apply in the present case.
The third way that is of relinquishment was the main point that has to be considered as the learned single judge held that prescription of appellant’s book by Guru Nanak Dev University would mean that the owner, i.e., the appellant has relinquished its copyright by dedicating the same in public domain.
But according to section 21 of ICA there are set of procedure that has
to be followed if rights has to be relinquished and in the present case the
appellant did not followed any such steps and thus merely by the fact that Guru
Nanak Dev University prescribed their book and its exercise to it’s student
than it would not mean that the appellant has relinquished his rights over
copyright and that his work is considered to be entered in public domain
So court held that the work of appellant had not entered in public domain.
Further the court discussed the issue of “Fair Use” which was described under section 52(1)(h) of ICA which allows reproduction of literary work and that in such case appellant cannot file for infringement but according to appellant that fair use under section 52(1)(h) can be used only by teachers or pupil and the respondents were neither teacher or pupil but were using the original text of appellant for commercial gains without giving any royalty to appellants. Court held that this case does not comes under section 52(1)(h) and no defence of fair use is available to respondents.
The court here also looked on the remarks of single learned judge and
according to him the respondents had complied their book(guide) with serious
labour and that they have not merely copied appellants work and the appellants
also agreed that the respondents book had a total of 1875 pages out of which
their work had only 185 pages in that book but according to appellants there
was no case of fair use by respondents. Court also held that respondents
were making these guides for weak students and thus moved on the third issue to
describe what is guidebooks.
Issue 3:-
Court discussed the nature and meaning of guidebook and held that guidebook means a manual or book of instruction on a specified subject" and court held that guidebooks are those books which help student to crack the paper.
The only question before court is that can use of guidebook comes under the virtue of fair use and court held that agreed with the decision of learned single judge bench that the book of respondent is not 100% copy of the book of appellant and court also saw that the pattern of both respondent and appellant is different and that respondent though used the grammar sentences that is original work of appellant but the respondent did not took all the sentences but he took only those exercise and sentences which were important from exam point of view, thus the guidebook is only a book that helps students to pass the exam and also that there is a difference in price rate of both the books and after analysing both the books thoroughly the court held that there is no infringement of copyright and upheld the decision of learned single judge bench and dismissed the appeal.
Also read - Registration of Copyrights
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