Case Name: Ankit Sahni v. Registrar of Copyrights (Re: Registration of the work “Suryast”)
Citation: Registration No. A-138408/2021 (Withdrawal Notice issued 2021)
Court/Authority: Indian Copyright Office (DPIIT)
Brief Facts: In 2020, Ankit Sahni, an intellectual property lawyer created an Artificial Intelligence application called RAGHAV (Robust Artificially Intelligent Graphics and Art Visualizer). Sahni created an artistic work named Suryast as an input to an original photograph and fed it into the AI and used the style of Vincent van Gogh in his work The Starry Night. Sahni submitted a second application as a joint author with RAGHAV after the Copyright Office had rejected an earlier application which listed RAGHAV as the sole author. This was first registered by the Indian Copyright Office in November 2020. In late 2021, however, after administrative consideration, the Office published a Withdrawal Notice, beginning a regulatory reversal of the status of the AI as a person and its ability to be an author.

I. ISSUE
Whether an Artificial Intelligence system is capable of being considered a Copyright Act, 1957 person, and whether the joint authorship provisions in Section 2(z) allow a non-human person to be a co-claimant to intellectual property rights.

II. RULE
This case is determined by the following statutory provisions and judicial doctrines:

1. Section 2(d) of the Copyright Act, 1957: Defines an “author” as a “person” who creates a work. Subsection (vi) deals specifically with computer-generated works, crediting the authorship to the individual who triggers the creation of the work.

2. Section 2(z) of the Copyright Act, 1957: Provides that joint authorship is a work created through cooperation of two or more authors where the contribution of one is not separate to the other.

3. Section 3(42) of the General Clauses Act, 1897: A person is defined as any company, association, or body of individuals and therefore, it is presumed that natural or juristic personality is required.

4. The “Modicum of Creativity” Doctrine: : This doctrine was developed in Eastern Book Company v. D.B. Modak (2008) which states that copyright only exists in works where the skill and judgment of an author is manifested.

III. APPLICATION
When the RAGHAV case is applied to the law, there is a deep contradiction between the Tool Theory of software and the Autonomous Agency of modern AI:

The Interpretation of the term personhood and Juristic Standing The application was initially accepted on the interpretation of Section 2(d)(vi) by the Copyright Office by a functional interpretation. The AI was a juristic entity since it is the one that did the creative work, argued Sahni. Nevertheless, the gift of the law is legal personhood, rather than technical. A person under the General Clauses Act has to be one who can exercise rights and more importantly, is obliged to incur liabilities. As RAGHAV is not liable to infringement of copyright or the execution of a licensing agreement, the Registrar determined that it does not have the legal
capacity of holding the title of author. This places an artificial limit to the extent to which the code may exceed the status of being a mere asset.

To constitute a work of joint authorship Under Common design or meeting of minds (consensus ad idem) In order to be considered a work of joint authorship pursuant to Section 2(z), there must be a common design or a meeting of minds (consensus ad idem). Sahni had argued that his choice of inputs (the photo and the Van Gogh style) coupled with interpolation by RAGHAV was a joint effort. Nevertheless, the notice of withdrawal by the Registrar suggests that the so- called collaboration demands conscious creativity. AI has no intention to create, it is data that is processed based on mathematical weights and biases. The connection between Sahni and RAGHAV is therefore technically that of User and Tool and not Co-Author and Co-Author.

The Modak Test: Skill vs. Processing The standard of copyright under the Modak rule is that copyright is not a reward to labor, but to the exercise of judgment. During the Suryast creation process the idea was created by Sahni and the neural network of the AI created the expression, the pixel-by-pixel representation. In its concurrent refusal to approve the application by Sahni, the US Copyright Office (USCO) pointed out that the work of the AI was not just mechanical but in fact overrode the creative decisions of the human. The work did not pass the human test of originality since the expression was not directly the product of human skill.

Section 2(d)(vi) Sahni argument on Causation was concluded largely on the phrase of a person that causes the work to be created. He claimed that he was the causal agent through commissioning the AI and giving the prompts. But the Registrar held that this exception applied to computer-assisted (such as Word or Photoshop) works, in which the computer is a passive tool. By choosing the ultimate aesthetic expression on its own, an AI, to the extent that this choice is a break in the causal chain between the human and the work, the AI cannot be said to have created the resulting creativity under the existing law.

IV. CONCLUSION
In the end, the Indian Copyright Office released a Withdrawal Notice, which practically established that an AI system cannot be defined as a person or a co-author under the Copyright Act, 1957. The case confirms that in India, human authorship is a prerequisite to copyright. Although the RAGHAV case has temporarily put India as a leader in AI recognition, the administrative overturn illustrates the very nature of the so-called Socio-Technical Gap, i.e., the fact that the law has no definitions and structures in place to provide rights to the non- sentient, non-juristic digital creators.

V. SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY
The Global Doctrinal Split: It is important to note how unusual the international consistency is with respect to the Suryast art. The Indian Copyright Office eventually withdrew their recognition but the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) continued to register the work with RAGHAV as a co-author. This aligns give way to the fact that the definition of a person is no longer a biological fact but a policy decision of jurisdiction.

Economic Implications: The denial of copyright protection to AI-generated works opens up a large investment vacuum. With a generative model output that instantly becomes public, national technology developers will be disadvantaged compared to jurisdictions where sui generis protection exists or in broader interpretations of authorship.

Precedential Value: The RAGHAV case is an element of the future Indian IP jurisprudence. This case has compelled the judiciary (including the Delhi High Court in related 20242026 petitions) to grapple with the problem of computational creativity by pushing the administrative boundaries of the Registrar. It acts as a sharp rebuttal that statutory wording written in 1957 is becoming less and less able to cope with the facts of algorithmic authorship.