Author:- Reteka Banik
College:- Barrister A.R. Antulay College of Law
To the Points
● The Reality: Companies use generative AI to create corporate logos, write code, and draft text assuming they hold full property ownership.
● The Problem: Indian property law does not recognize computer programs as legal creators.
● The Impact: If an AI does all the creative design work, you own 0% of the legal rights.
● The Consequence: Your competitors can legally copy, reuse, or sell your raw AI-generated assets for free, and you cannot stop them in court.
● The Solution: Treat AI tools purely as a helper. A human must manually edit, style, and alter the output to secure legal protection.
Use of Legal Jargon
To understand how these disputes unfold in an Indian courtroom, we must parse the specific language inside the Copyright Act, 1957:
● Author (Section 2d): This defines the specific person who creates a work. The law explicitly names human entities (like writers or photographers) for different creative mediums.
● Computer-Generated Work (Section 2d vi): This rule states that if a computer creates a work, the author is “the person who causes the work to be created.”
● Modicum of Creativity: This is a mandatory legal doctrine used by judges. It dictates that a work must show a minimal level of real human brainpower, choice, and judgment to get a copyright.
● Public Domain: A state where creative works are not protected by intellectual property laws. Content in the public domain belongs to the public, meaning anyone can use it without permission or payment.
The Proof
Many corporate teams try to use Section 2(d)(vi) to protect their business assets. They argue that typing a long, highly complex prompt means they “caused” the work to be created, making them the author.
However, the law separates the idea from the expression. A text prompt is legally viewed as just a general idea. The AI software handles the actual expression by choosing the pixels, lines, and color combinations. Because Indian law only protects the final expression and the machine executing that expression is an inanimate tool—the text prompt fails to clear the modicum of creativity standard. Thus, the raw output remains completely unprotectable.
Abstract
The rapid deployment of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools across corporate sectors has disrupted traditional intellectual property (IP) architectures within the Indian legal ecosystem. This article addresses a critical emerging statutory question: can an algorithm achieve authorship under the Copyright Act, 1957? By analyzing structural definitions, the strict doctrine of human creative selection, and recent judicial interventions by regional High Courts, this paper demonstrates that autonomous machine-generated content occupies a non-proprietary status. Without significant, documentable human intervention, pure AI outputs collapse into the public domain. This reality leaves enterprise assets completely vulnerable to unauthorized commercial exploitation.
Case Law
We can see how Indian judges handle this problem by looking at real cases on the Manupatra legal database:
● 1. Eastern Book Company v. D.B. Modak (2008): The Supreme Court of India ruled that a work must show independent skill, talent, and judgment by a human mind to get a copyright. It held that purely mechanical or automated adjustments do not count. This case proves that raw AI work lacks the human mind input needed for legal validation.
● 2. The “Suryast” Painting Issue (Ankit Sahni Case): An artist used an AI tool named “RAGHAV” to repaint a photo. The Indian Copyright Office accidentally approved a registration listing the AI tool as a co-author. Realizing a machine cannot hold property, the government sent a notice to withdraw the registration. This proved that the Indian government will not allow AI tools to be legal co-authors.
● 3. The Madras High Court Decision (March 2025): A tech firm tried to claim copyright for digital art created by their proprietary AI software. The Madras High Court rejected the case. The judge stated clearly that purely AI-generated content cannot get copyright protection because an algorithm lacks conscious creative intent and human intellect.
Conclusion
The message from Indian courts is clear: If an AI does all the creative work, you do not own the legal rights. You cannot protect a design, text, or code if it came purely out of an AI prompt box.
To protect your company, follow these two practical steps:
● Treat AI as a helper, not the creator: Use AI to get a rough baseline draft. Then, have a human designer edit, change, and add new things to it manually.
● Keep your digital trail: Save your original human sketches, notes, and editing steps. This proof shows the court that a human mind did the final creative work, which protects your copyright.
FAQ
Q1: If I spend 5 hours typing a very long and detailed prompt, do I get the copyright?
No matter how detailed your prompt is, Indian law treats it as just an idea while the machine handles the actual expression, meaning you get zero copyright and the raw image stays in the public domain.
Q2: What happens if I take an AI image and edit it myself in Photoshop?
If you take that AI image and genuinely rework it in Photoshop, you still don’t own the original AI baseline, but you do own your new, substantial human edits.
Q3: Can the AI company sue me for selling things with their AI art?
The AI company generally won’t sue you for selling it as long as their terms allow commercial use, but because you don’t hold the copyright, competitors can legally copy and sell that exact same raw design without your permission.