Copyright extends to theme, plot and storyline of a literary work: HC

The Bombay high court (HC) has held that in the case of literary works, copyright extends not only to expression of the core idea but also to its theme, plot, and

The Bombay high court (HC) has held that in the case of literary works, copyright extends not only to expression of the core idea but also to its theme, plot, and storyline.

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The order, which was pronounced on Friday, was in regards to a plea filed by Urdu writer Shamoil Ahmad Khan claiming that Falguni Shah and two others had infringed his copyright on one of his short stories, ‘Singardan’ and produced a web series under the same title which was being aired on online platforms. Khan claimed that producers of the web series had not only copied his title, but also the entire plot, narrative, and characters of his story.

Producers of the web series opposed his plea for an injunction, claiming that except for the central idea of ‘Singardaan’, there was no other similarity between Khan’s literary work and the web series. They claimed that the central idea, set during riots, about a man taking a dressing table from a brothel to his home and how its use leads to changes in the behaviour of the womenfolk at home, was not entitled to any copyright protection.

They submitted that the depiction of the central idea in the web series, scene to scene, situation to situation, in-climax to anti-climax, including the pathos, texture, treatment, purport, and presentation, was materially different from Khan’s story and therefore, there was no question of infringement.

The argument, however, failed to impress upon justice SC Gupte. The judge agreed that that copyright does not extend to ideas, schemes, systems, or methods and it is confined to their expression; and if the expression is not copied, the copyright is not infringed.

However, he clarified that in a literary work, a germ of an idea is developed into a theme and then into a plot and then finally a story, with the help of characters and settings. It is the combination of all these elements which give substance to the work. “If one goes on stripping the final work of these various elements, one may finally come to the bare idea or abstraction which no longer enjoys copyright protection,” Gupte said.

“The narration is the life and blood of the plaintiff’s [Khan’s] story,” said the judge, adding that it cannot be said that the writer has copyright only in the details of expression.

“If someone steals this theme, plot, and storyline, is he not thereby plagiarising the expression of the plaintiff’s work? Can the theme, plot, and storyline be simply dismissed as non-protectable ideas of the plaintiff’s work and not its expression? I think not. We have not yet reached that level of extraction where the work can be stripped to its non-protectable idea,” the judge said.

Gupte concluded that though the producers of the web series developed Khan’s theme, plot, and storyline differently, prima facie it was a case of copyright infringement. The court restrained the producers from making any further adaptation of ‘Singardaan’ and directed them to maintain accounts of the revenue earned from the web series, right from its inception till the disposal of Khan’s suit.