In 2021, the government of India’s decision to register Recorded Music Performance Limited (RMPL), and not Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL), as the country’s sole copyright society with respect to sound recordings, was thought to be controversial. That was because the 85-year-old PPL owns and controls the public performance rights for over 450 labels operating in India, including the three international majors, large local players such as T-Series and Times Music, and top south Indian regional-language labels like Lahari Music and Aditya Music.
On 11 June, PPL was reinstated as a copyright society following the expiration of RMPL’s five-year term. The news was celebrated by executives from several of the aforementioned labels who are lauding PPL’s reinstatement as it will end some of the confusion that has pervaded the Indian music industry for the last half-decade.
“For several years, many commercial users of music withheld payment of legitimate licence fees on the ground that PPL was not registered as a copyright society,” the organisation said in a statement shared with the press. “As a consequence, copyright owners represented by PPL, and the artists associated with their recordings, were deprived of royalties arising from the commercial use of their music. With the grant of registration, any uncertainty regarding PPL’s status stands resolved.”
The statement also had some strong words for music rights exploiters. It said, “PPL expects businesses and establishments using copyrighted sound recordings without authorisation to regularise such usage by obtaining the required licences and paying applicable licence fees, thereby ensuring that rightful royalties reach copyright owners and artists.”
That’s something that has been made easier for all the parties involved recently with the launch, in February, of Sangeet Dwar, a “unified, digital one-window platform designed to streamline permissions for on-ground public music performances across the country”. The platform is a collaboration between PPL and its counterparts such as Novex and RMPL as well as the Indian Performing Right Society (IPRS).
