Decoding the Duration of Copyright: A Comprehensive Guide

Every creative work – a novel, a film score, a photograph, a government report – enjoys copyright protection for a finite window of time. Once that window closes, the work enters the public domain, free for anyone to use, adapt, or build upon. But how long exactly is that window? And does it differ depending on what kind of work we are talking about? Under the Copyright Act, 1957, the answer is: it depends. Chapter V of the Act (Sections 22 to 29) lays out a carefully structured framework that assigns a specific term of copyright to each category of work. Understanding this framework is essential for creators, publishers, legal professionals, and students of intellectual property law alike.

Why does the term of copyright matter? 🔗

Copyright protection is not a perpetual monopoly. The duration of copyright protection in India is not perpetual; it extends for a specific period, after which the works enter the public domain. This balance is deliberate. Creators get an exclusive window to exploit their works commercially and morally. Society, in return, eventually gets free access to those works. The length of that window is called the term of copyright. Get it wrong – either by assuming a work is still protected when it is not, or by freely using a work that is still under protection – and the consequences can be legally serious.

India, being a signatory to the Berne Convention, is required to protect copyright for a minimum of 50 years post the author’s death. Until 1992, India followed exactly that threshold. The Copyright Amendment Act, 1992 extended the term from 50 years to 60 years, bringing India’s protection period above the international minimum. Today, the standard term for most works is either life of the author plus 60 years, or a flat 60 years from the year of publication, depending on the category.

Literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works: the life + 60 formula 🔗

The foundational rule for the most common categories of works is set out in Section 22 of the Act. Copyright for a published work lasts for sixty years from the beginning of the calendar year following the year of the author’s death. This applies to literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works.

A critical detail here is that the clock does not start ticking from the exact date of death. It resets to 1st January of the following calendar year. So if an author of a novel dies on 15th August 2020, the 60-year term begins from 1st January 2021, and the copyright expires on 31st December 2080. This calendar-year convention is consistent across all categories of works under the Act and simplifies calculation considerably.

It is also worth noting that Section 22 applies only to works that were published during the author’s lifetime. Unpublished works and posthumous publications are governed by a separate provision, which we will discuss shortly.

Works of joint authorship 🔗

When two or more authors collaborate on a single work – and where the contribution of each cannot be separated from the rest – the work qualifies as a work of joint authorship under Section 2(z) of the Copyright Act. For such works, the term of copyright does not end with the death of the first author. When a work has joint authors, the copyright runs from the death of the last surviving author.

This makes practical sense. Since the contribution of joint authors is inseparable, the work as a whole continues to reflect the creative effort of all its authors. Ending copyright on the death of the first author would unfairly cut short the rights of surviving co-authors. The 60-year term therefore only begins after the last surviving author has passed away, calculated again from 1st January of the following calendar year.

Anonymous and pseudonymous works: Section 23 🔗

What happens when an author writes under a pen name, or publishes without revealing their identity at all? Section 23 of the Copyright Act addresses this scenario. For works published anonymously or under a pseudonym, copyright protection lasts for sixty years from the beginning of the calendar year after the year of the first publication.

However, the law accounts for the possibility that the author’s identity may eventually come to light. If the identity is disclosed – either publicly by both the author and the publisher, or to the satisfaction of the court – before the 60-year period ends, the copyright term shifts back to the standard life-plus-60 formula. In other words, the disclosure of authorship effectively unlocks the longer protection term.

Where a work has multiple authors and only some identities are disclosed, the calculation is done based on the disclosed authors. If only one author’s identity is revealed, the term runs from that author’s death. If multiple identities are disclosed, it runs from the death of the last among them. The Act’s approach here ensures that anonymous works are never left in a protection vacuum, while still rewarding transparency about authorship.

Posthumous works: Section 24 🔗

A posthumous work is one that was not published during the author’s lifetime. Under Section 24, for literary, dramatic, musical works, or engravings where copyright subsists at the date of the author’s death but the work has not yet been published, copyright runs for sixty years from the beginning of the calendar year next following the year in which the work is first published.

The trigger here is publication – not death. This is a key distinction from Section 22. Take an unpublished manuscript discovered and published in 2010: copyright would run until 31st December 2070, regardless of when the author died. The law also clarifies that for the purpose of this section, a work is deemed “published” even if it has only been publicly performed, or if sound recordings of it have been offered for sale – not just if physical copies were distributed.

For joint authorship situations under Section 24, the relevant reference point is the death of the author who died last, as long as copyright was subsisting at or just before that date.

Cinematograph films and sound recordings: the flat 60-year rule 🔗

Unlike literary or artistic works, cinematograph films and sound recordings are not tied to the life of any individual author. The copyright term for both is calculated purely from the date of publication. Under Sections 26 and 27, copyright in cinematographic films and sound recordings subsists for 60 years commencing from the 1st day of the year following the year in which the work was published.

So a film released in 2000 would have copyright protection running until 31st December 2060. A sound recording first made commercially available in 1985 would have entered the public domain on 1st January 2046. This publication-based model reflects the fact that these works are typically the result of corporate or collaborative production effort rather than a single identifiable creator’s lifetime of work.

An important note on photographs: prior to the Copyright (Amendment) Act, 2012, photographs had a separate provision under Section 25. The 2012 amendment omitted that section, and photographs are now treated as artistic works under Section 22 – meaning they enjoy the life-plus-60 protection rather than a flat term from publication.

Government works and public undertakings: Sections 28 and 28A 🔗

Works created by or for the government occupy a distinct category. Under Section 28, in the case of a government work where the government is the first owner of the copyright, copyright subsists until sixty years from the beginning of the calendar year next following the year in which the work is first published.

Section 28A, inserted by the Copyright (Amendment) Act, 1983, extends the same rule to works of public undertakings. The Act defines a public undertaking to include undertakings owned or controlled by the government, government companies as defined under the Companies Act, and body corporates established under any Central, Provincial, or State Act. For such entities, the copyright term is again 60 years from 1st January of the year following publication.

The key condition in both cases is that the government or public undertaking must be the first owner of the copyright. If a government department commissions a private author and that author retains copyright, Section 28 does not apply. The ownership question is therefore critical to determining which provision governs the term.

Works of international organisations: Section 29 🔗

Section 29 covers works where the first owner of copyright is an international organisation to which Section 41 of the Act applies – typically bodies like the United Nations or its agencies, which have been notified by the Central Government for this purpose. Copyright in such works lasts for 60 years commencing on the 1st day of the succeeding year in which the international organisation first published the work in India. The structure mirrors the government works provision exactly.

Performer’s rights: a related but distinct term 🔗

While not a “term of copyright” in the traditional sense, it is worth noting that performers – musicians, actors, dancers, and others – have a related set of rights under the Act. Performers’ rights last for 50 years from the beginning of the calendar year following the year in which the performance was first given. This is shorter than the copyright term for most categories of works, and is governed separately from the authorship-based copyright framework discussed above.

How to calculate the term: a quick reference 🔗

The logic underlying all these provisions follows the same structure: identify the triggering event (death, publication, or performance), move to 1st January of the following calendar year, and count 60 years forward from that date. The table below summarises the key categories:

• Published literary, dramatic, musical, artistic works (Section 22): Life of author + 60 years from 1st January of the year following death.
• Joint authorship works: 60 years from 1st January of the year following the death of the last surviving author.
• Anonymous/pseudonymous works (Section 23): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication; reverts to life + 60 if author’s identity is disclosed.
• Posthumous works (Section 24): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication.
• Cinematograph films (Section 26): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication.
• Sound recordings (Section 27): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication.
• Photographs: Treated as artistic works post-2012; life + 60 years applies.
• Government works (Section 28): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication.
• Works of public undertakings (Section 28A): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication.
• Works of international organisations (Section 29): 60 years from 1st January of the year following first publication in India.

What happens when copyright expires? 🔗

Once the term of copyright comes to an end, the work moves into the public domain. At that point, no permission is needed to reproduce, adapt, translate, perform, or distribute it. Rabindranath Tagore’s literary works, for instance, have long since entered the public domain in India given how many decades have passed since his death in 1941. Many classical Indian films from the early decades of cinema are similarly in the public domain or approaching it. This is not a loss for the original creator – by then, the economic purpose of the copyright term has been fully served. It is, instead, a gain for society.

The finite nature of copyright is what makes the public domain rich and growing. Every year, as copyright terms expire on works created generations ago, new material becomes freely available to researchers, educators, artists, and the general public – precisely as the framers of the Copyright Act, 1957 intended.

What do you think? If you were a musician who collaborated equally with a co-composer on an album – and that co-composer outlived you by decades – do you think it is fair that your heirs must wait until the co-composer’s death for the 60-year term to even begin? And given that photographs were treated differently from other artistic works before 2012, does bringing them under the same life-plus-60 framework strengthen or complicate copyright protection for photographers in the digital age?

References

1. https://www.indiacode.nic.in/bitstream/123456789/15356/1/the_copyright_act,_1957.pdf
2. https://lawbhoomi.com/duration-of-copyright-in-india/
3. https://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/legislation/details/2396
4. https://www.quickcompany.in/articles/different-copyright-works-in-india
5. https://thelegalschool.in/blog/copyright-time-period-in-india
6. https://www.copyright.gov.in/documents/handbook.html
7. https://copyright.gov.in/documents/copyrightrules1957.pdf
8. https://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/text/128097