Chennai (Tamil Nadu): Music companies including Echo and AGI have signed an agreement to use 4,500 songs of noted music composer Ilaiyaraaja. After the contract expired, Ilaiyaraaja filed a lawsuit, claiming that the songs were being used without his permission.
Anita Sumant, a single judge of the Madras High Court, who heard the case, issued an order in 2019 that the music companies have the right to use Ilaiyaraaja's songs after acquiring the rights from the concerned producers, but at the same time, Ilayaraja also has a personal special right over these songs.
A two-judge bench hearing an appeal filed by Ilayaraja against the ruling that music companies also have rights imposed an interim ban on music companies from using Ilayaraja's songs.
Meanwhile, an appeal has been filed on behalf of Echo, claiming that the copyright of the film is with the producer and that they have the right to use the songs based on the contract with them.
The case was heard again on Wednesday by Justices R Mahadevan and Mohammad Shafiq. At that time, senior lawyer Vijay Narayan, who appeared on behalf of Echo Company, said that since the producer had paid Ilaiyaraaja for composing the music, the rights would go to the producer. They claimed that the songs became theirs as they got the rights from the producer.
Responding to this, senior advocate Sathish Parasaran, representing Ilaiyaraaja, contended that since music composition is a creative work, copyright law does not apply.
The judges who intervened then said if so, the lyrics, the singer, and everything else together make the song. No lyrics, no song. What if the songwriter also claims the rights to the song? they questioned.
After this, the judges adjourned the hearing of the case to the second week of June.
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