Indias Expert Panel to Evaluate Copyright Laws in Response to OpenAIs Legal Challenges

India has established a committee to assess whether the current copyright regulations are adequate for addressing disputes related to artificial intelligence, according to an official memo. This development comes as OpenAI is faced with legal difficulties concerning allegations of misusing copyrighted content.

A lawsuit in the New Delhi high court initiated by a coalition of prominent Indian media organizations and book publishers claims that the company utilizes their material without authorization to train its ChatGPT chatbot, which could have significant implications for the industry in India.

OpenAI has refuted any allegations of misconduct.

The confidential memo indicates that the commerce ministry formed a panel of eight specialists last month to investigate matters concerning AI and its repercussions for the country’s copyright legislation.

The appointed experts are expected to «identify and scrutinize the legal and policy issues that arise from the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in relation to copyright,» the memo specified.

This panel, comprising intellectual property lawyers, government representatives, and industry leaders, will also evaluate the effectiveness of the Copyright Act of 1957 in addressing these issues and will provide recommendations to the government, it noted.

Both the commerce and infotech ministries of India have not responded to inquiries from Reuters.

The copyright legislation is central to the lawsuits involving OpenAI in India.

Billionaire Gautam Adani’s NDTV, along with the Indian Express and Hindustan Times publications, as well as the Digital News Publishers Association—which represents major news agencies—have expressed worries regarding copyright breaches by AI platforms utilizing their information to develop such applications.

OpenAI asserts that it employs publicly available data to train its chatbot, which it argues does not breach Indian copyright laws, and claims to offer an opt-out option for websites that prefer not to have their data utilized.

Globally, courts are considering cases brought by authors, news agencies, and musicians who accuse tech firms of employing their copyrighted content to train AI services without consent or compensation.

© Thomson Reuters 2025

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)