Open Courses, Closed Laws: Landscape of Section 52 of Copyright in the MOOC Boom.
This article is written by Faheem Khan, pursuing B.A.LL.B from Madhusudan Law College, Cuttack.
The digital revolution has redefined the contours of education in India, with Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and emerging EdTech platforms transforming how knowledge is created, accessed, and disseminated. However this technological change has revealed the shortcomings of the existing copyright system provided for under the Copyright Act, 1957, especially Section 52, whose provisions were framed mainly for a physical and analogue educational context.
As digital classrooms, digital textbooks and digital repositories increase in importance, and virtual learning systems become more common, the tension between the interests of copyright holders and the public interest in access to learning becomes greater. This paper addresses the shortcomings of current fair dealing framework to respond to modern digital educational practices, as well as the legal uncertainties and imprecision of MOOCs, EdTech platforms, digital reproduction, and dissemination of copyrighted content online. It also calls for moving to a more flexible, technology-neutral and goal-oriented approach that would be able to strike a balance between innovation, creators' rights, and the constitutional commitment to a digital age, in which education should be made accessible to all.
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