Moral rights.
Moral rights are the things that people can do or have unalienable access to as defined to the prevailing societal conventions of the time. Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.[i]
Moral rights are representative of social values concerning authorship, creativity and artistic creation is something more than an attempt to earn a livelihood. These rights flow from the fact that a literary or artistic work reflects the personality of the creator, just as much as the economic rights reflect the author’s need to keep body and soul together.[ii]
Moral rights or ‘droit moral ‘originated in French law. The Rome Act of 1928 added the droit moral to the Bern Convention of 1886. Moral rights finds expression in section 57 of the Copyright Act , 1957 which is in accordance with Article 6bis of the Berne Convention. They are the author’s or creator’s special right which includes the right to paternity (the right to claim authorship of a work) and the right to integrity (the right to protect author’s honor and reputation). The Berne Convention requires these rights to be independent of author’s economic rights. Moral rights are only accorded to individual authors and in many national laws they remain with the authors even after the authors have transferred their economic rights.
Moral right is different from other rights such as legal right.
Moral rights are ones that are determined by a moral system which are declared by a religion, philosophy, cultural values, or personal code while legal rights are those that are declared by a legal body and set as law.
Legal rights are enforceable by law but moral rights are not enforceable by law.
Example for moral right: if you are a student and paid the examination fee of a classmate without his request so as to save him from losing his chance in the examination, and if he doesn’t return the amount to you, you cannot go to court.
Example of legal right: In the above example, if you have helped your friend on his request, you can go to court to make him pay back the amount as it was a contract formed out of one’s request and other’s acceptance.[iii]
Moral rights of copyright owners.
Copyright refers to the legal right of the owner of intellectual property. In simpler terms, copyright is the right to copy. This means that original creators of the product and anyone they give authorization are the only ones with exclusive rights. A copyright is an exclusive rights granted by law for a limited period to an author, designer, etc. for his/her original work.
A “copyright owner” or “copyright holder” is a person or a company who owns any one of the exclusive rights of copyright in a work.
- The right to reproduce and make copies of an original work;
- The right to prepare derivative works based on the original work;
- The right to distribute copies to the public by sale or another form of transfer, such as rental or lending;
- The right to publicly perform the work;
- The right to publicly display the work, and
The reproduction right is perhaps the most important right granted by the Copyright Act. Under this right, no one other than the copyright owner may make any reproductions or copies of the work.
According to the Copyright Act, a derivative work is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted.
The distribution right grants to the copyright holder the exclusive right to make a work available to the public by sale, rental, lease, or lending
Under the public performance right, a copyright holder is allowed to control when the work is performed “publicly.”
The public display right is similar to the public performance right, except that this right controls the public “display” of a work.[iv]
Rights of person who gives copyrighted work.
The Copyright Act, 1957 provides copyright protection in India in following forms:
a. Economic rights of the author
b. Moral Rights of the author.
Economic rights of the author:
The rights are mainly, in respect of literary, dramatic and musical, other than computer program, to reproduce the work in any material form including the storing of it in any medium by electronic means, to issue copies of the work to the public, to perform the work in public or communicating it to the public, to make any cinematograph film or sound recording in respect of the work, and to make any translation or adaptation of the work.
Moral Rights of the author:
Moral rights are rights that the creator of work is automatically entitled to and which no one else can claim. The moral rights of work can even remain with the creator after their death. Under Section 57 of the Act defines the two basic ‘moral rights of an author as follows:
a. Right of paternity
b. Right of integrity
The right of paternity refers to a right of an author to claim authorship of work and a right to prevent all others from claiming authorship of his work.
Right of integrity empowers the author to prevent distortion, mutilation or other alterations of his work, or any other action in relation to said work, which would be prejudicial to his honor or reputation.[v]
Case law:
Case I.
The first case pertaining to authors’ moral rights- Mannu Bhandari v Kala Vikas Pictures Ltd.
In this case , the court examined the substance of the protection granted by the integrity right under section 57 of the act. The case pertained to the adaptation of the novel “Aap Ka Bunty “into the defendants’ film “Samay Ki Dhara”. The court had to consider whether the adaption amounted to multination or distortion of the author’s work. Parties eventually reached a settlement among themselves. The court observed that section 57 is the statuatory recognition of an author’s intellectual property and must be protected with special care .
Case II.
Delhi High Court’s Verdict in Amar Nath Sehgal v Union of India(1987):
This case deals with the issue of an author exercising their moral rights after assigning copyright.
In1957 the government commissioned Mr. Sehgal to create a bronze mural sculpture, which was to be displayed in Vigyan Bhawan. In 1979 the government removed the mural and stowed it away without Sehgal’s consent. Consequently, Sehgal filed suit seeking to enforce section 57 of the act and hold the government liable for its violations of his moral rights. Further , the court interpreted the integrity right broadly enough to encompass the protection of India’s culture heritage and deemed the mural to be an Indian national treasure and thus applied section 57 of the act.
Case III.
Delhi high court judgement Sartaj singh Pannu v Gurbani Media Pvt. Ltd :
This case addressed the issue of the waiver of moral rights where question was whether film directors can be considered authors and waive their moral rights. In this case Sartaj Singh Pannu a young film Director seeks orders restraining Gurbani Media Pvt. Ltd. from releasing the film ‘Nanak Shah Fakir’ without giving credit as the ‘sole Director’ of the film.
Initially court concluded that at the present stage, without further evidence being led, it is not possible to conclusively hold that Pannu is the sole Director of the film. The Court further concluded that the question whether a Director of a film could be considered an ‘author’ of an ‘artistic work’ would also depend on the facts of each case. Again, at the present stage, without evidence being led, the Court is unable to conclude that Pannu was coerced or otherwise compelled into waiving his rights to be acknowledged as a Director of the film ‘Nanak Shah Fakir’.[vi]
Conclusion.
Copyright laws are meant to protect the person efforts and skills. It act as an obstruction for the infringement of the same. However, the moral rights are such right which cannot be licensed like economic one. The moral value of a person is attached and no one has right to deteriot the condition of a person. These rights are acting as a preserving measure of skill and interest of such person and hence their hardwork deserve to be protected
References.
[i]http://www.legalserviceindia.com/article/195-Copyright-Law-in-India.html
[ii] https://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/wipo_pub_909_2016.pdf
[iii]Chawla, alka”Law of copyright”,Lexis nexis, Fourth Edition. Pg. no.121
[iv] https://www.lawctopus.com/academike/moral-rights-author/
[v]https://www.mondaq.com/india/copyright/537094/moral-rights-under-copyright-law
[vi] https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=0e35276b-9737-47dd-9c1a-94ef6d25036d
Eduindex News 