The Marrakesh Treaty And Copyright Exceptions For Persons With Print Disabilities: India’s Experience
- IJLLR Journal
- 1 minute ago
- 1 min read
Adv Sachin Mungrati, Department of Intellectual Property Rights, National Law University and Judicial Academy, Assam (NLUJAA)
ABSTRACT
Access to reading and information is essentially linked to human rights of people with print disabilities. For many years, the international copyright system that was highly skewed towards protecting authorial and economic rights inadvertently created a situation of ‘book famine.’ The Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons Who Are Blind, Visually Impaired, or Otherwise Print Disabled (2013) marked an important landmark in international intellectual property law by incorporating human rights in copyright law. India, the frontrunner among developing countries, became the first nation to ratify the Treaty, bringing into harmony its laws mostly by virtue of Copyright (Amendment) Act, 2012, more specifically Section 52(1)(zb). This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of theoretical bases of copyright exceptions, discussing provisions of the Marrakesh Treaty and their application in the Indian context. While critically evaluating present practices, the study identifies gaps in implementation of the Treaty in India, including DRM restrictions, uncertainties about ‘authorized entities,’ infrastructural inadequacies, and language differences. Moreover, when we look at these differences through the lens of global justice, there appear to be structural inequalities present in international intellectual property agreements. In the end, the article suggests several constructive and innovative assessments that could be made, from changing the Information Technology Act to forming government-sponsored decentralized storage.
