Textbook photocopy: No immediate relief to foreign publishers

Leading foreign publishers, which challenged a verdict allowing photocopying of textbooks published by them, today failed to get any immediate relief from the Delhi High Court which said the matter would be heard on priority basis.
"We have kept the matter for final disposal on November 29. We kept it on a very short date. We shall hear you and pass the order. So as of now, no interim order," a bench of justices Pradeep Nandrajog and Pratibha Rani said.
Acknowledging that it was considering the seriousness of the issue, the bench noted that it was a crucial matter as the verdict had led not only one photocopy shop, but hundreds of them, to sell photocopies.

The bench, meanwhile, asked the respondent to keep record of the papers purchased and utilised in the photocopying of the textbooks.
The publishers -- Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press (UK), Cambridge University Press India Pvt Ltd, Taylor and Francis Group (UK) and Taylor and Francis Books India Pvt Ltd, which sought stay on September 16 order, alleged that Rameshwari Photocopy Service in Delhi University was infringing upon their copyright over the text books.
The single judge order had brought cheers to a large number of students, which had rejected the publishers plea against the sale of photocopies of their textbooks, saying the copyright in literary works does not confer "absolute ownership" to the authors.

It had also lifted a ban on Rameshwari Photocopy Service in DU campus from selling photocopies of chapters from textbooks of international publishers to students.
The publishers contended that "through this appeal, we seek assurance that copyright law in India will balance the interests of those creating learning materials here in India as well as globally, with those requiring access to them in a fair and sustainable manner".
The single judge order had come on a plea by publishers, who had moved the high court in 2012 alleging that Rameshwari Photocopy Service was infringing upon their copyright over the text books.