Delhi High Court clarifies footage use
- On February 28, 2026, Justice Tejas Karia gave TV9 summary judgment, saying short third-party clips in its news videos did not infringe copyright. - The court said TV9’s footage use was fair dealing and de minimis, and barred defendants from sending further groundless copyright threats. - The ruling targets YouTube strike abuse without follow-up lawsuits. (scconline.com)
The Delhi High Court ruled on February 28 that TV9’s use of short third-party clips in news videos was fair dealing, not copyright infringement. (indiankanoon.org) Justice Tejas Karia granted summary judgment to Associated Broadcasting Company Limited, which runs the TV9 network, in its suit against Google LLC and other defendants over YouTube copyright strikes. (delhihighcourt.nic.in) (thelawdaily.com) The case grew out of TV9 videos posted between 2020 and 2023 on events including hurricanes, floods, the Israel-Hamas war and the Chinese spy balloon, using short clips inside longer news packages. (moneycontrol.com) (scconline.com) The court held that Section 52(1)(a)(iii) of India’s Copyright Act protects fair dealing for reporting current events, and that TV9’s use also fell within the de minimis doctrine for trivial copying. (indiankanoon.org) (scconline.com) That matters on platforms like YouTube because three copyright strikes in 90 days can terminate a channel and wipe out its subscriber base under the platform’s policy described in the litigation. (moneycontrol.com) The judgment also turned on Section 60 of the Copyright Act, which lets a target of groundless infringement threats sue for a declaration and injunction if the claimant does not properly pursue legal action. (scconline.com) SCC Times said the court found that copyright strike notices under YouTube’s policy are not, by themselves, a mechanism that resolves whether infringement actually occurred. (scconline.com) Google was not held liable on the merits in the summary judgment against defendants 2 to 5, while the court restrained those defendants from issuing further groundless threats against TV9 over the disputed works. (delhihighcourt.nic.in) (thelawdaily.com) The ruling leans on older Delhi High Court sports-broadcast cases that treated brief excerpts for news reporting as potentially fair, then applies that logic to digital current-affairs video and platform strikes. (indiankanoon.org) (managingip.com) For publishers, the line the court drew is narrow: brief clips, embedded in original reporting on current events, got protection; standalone reposting or market-substituting use did not get a pass. (indiankanoon.org) (managingip.com)
