The Delhi High Court made a recent observation stating that while nobody can assert copyright over ancient religious texts like the Bhagavad Gita or Bhagavatam, any original explanations, adaptations, or dramatic works derived from these texts would be eligible for copyright protection.

Justice Prathiba M Singh emphasized that there is no issue with reproducing the actual text of the Bhagavad Gita or similar spiritual books. However, she noted that copyright laws would come into play when it concerns the way these texts are interpreted and explained by various Gurus and spiritual teachers.

The court stated, “There can be no copyright claimed in the Scriptures. However, any adaptations of the said work including providing an explanation, summary, meaning, exegesis/interpretation or creating any audio-visual works e.g., television series like Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayana or BR Chopra’s Mahabharata; dramatic works created by drama societies based on scriptures, etc, being transformative works, would be entitled to copyright protection - being original works of the Authors themselves.”

The Court made these remarks while addressing a copyright infringement lawsuit brought forward by the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, an organization founded by Srila Prabhupada, who is the founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON).

During the court proceedings, it was presented that Prabhupada was a distinguished scholar, philosopher, and cultural representative who disseminated the teachings of various Hindu scriptures both within India and internationally.

It was noted that he authored numerous lectures and published books that are embraced by followers in multiple languages. Many of these writings were described as simplified religious texts and scriptures, designed to make them accessible and comprehensible to the general public.

It was argued that the copyright for all of these works belonged to the author, and following his passing in 1977, the copyright was transferred to the plaintiff's trust.

The plaintiff requested an injunction against four websites, five mobile applications, and four Instagram accounts that had uploaded and shared the copyrighted works owned by the plaintiff with the public.

Justice Singh carefully reviewed the case and observed that there had been extensive infringement and piracy of the plaintiff's intellectual property.

The Court noted that upon reviewing the evidence, it became evident that the materials provided by Defendants 1 to 14 were exact replicas of the plaintiff's works, which were authored by Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, also known as 'Srila Prabhupada.' These were not simply reproductions of the original scriptures as they were, including the verses, but rather, they replicated the translations (Anuvaad), interpretations (Tatparya), summaries, introductions, prefaces, covers, and other elements as well.

The single judge expressed the view that allowing such piracy of copyrighted works cannot be tolerated. If such infringement is not curbed, it could significantly undermine the copyright protection of the works, resulting in substantial revenue losses.

In response to this situation, Justice Singh issued an ex-parte interim injunction order against the defendants, prohibiting them from engaging in any further infringement of the plaintiff's copyrighted works. Furthermore, Justice Singh ordered Google and Meta to remove the applications and pages associated with the defendants.

The Court also instructed the authorities to issue blocking orders against the websites in question, thereby preventing access to them.

Case: The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, India vs. Https://bhagavatam.in/#gsc. Tab=0 & ors, CS(COMM) 657/2023 and I.A. 18425/2023-18431/2023.