Section 63 of Copyright Act penalizing copyright infringement is cognizable, non-bailable offence: Supreme Court

In a significant ruling, the Supreme Court has held that Section 63 of the Copyright Act, which penalizes infringement of copyright, is a cognizable and a non-bailable offence [M/s Knit Pro International vs State of NCT of Delhi]..A Division bench of Justices MR Shah and B V Nagarathna set aside a judgment of the Delhi High Court dated November 25, 2019 which had held Section 63 to be non-cognizable and a bailable offence."It is observed and held that offence under Section 63 of the Copyright Act is a cognizable and non-bailable offence. Consequently, the impugned judgment and order passed by the High Court taking a contrary view is hereby quashed and set aside and the criminal proceedings against respondent no. 2 for the offence under sections 63 & 64 of the Copyright Act now shall be proceeded further in accordance with law and on its own merits treating the same as a cognizable and non-bailable offence," the top court ruled. .By way of background, the appellant-company had approached a Chief Metropolitan Magistrate seeking to lodge a first information report (FIR) against one Anurag Sanghi, a resident of Pitampura under Sections 63 and 64 of the Copyright Act for an alleged infringement of the copyright work of the firm. The Magistrate, after going through the material on record, ordered the police authorities to register an FIR against the accused.The FIR was challenged before the Delhi High Court, which by its order of November 25, 2019 quashed the same on the ground that Section 63 is a non-cognizable and a bailable offence since it doesn't provide a punishment of more than three years..Before the top court, the company's counsel RK Tarun contended that the Delhi High Court committed a grave error by holding that Section 63 isn't a cognizable offence and that it does not fall within Part II of the First Schedule of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).He further argued that the High Court did not properly appreciate the decision of the apex court in the case of Rakesh Kumar Paul vs State of Assam and misinterpreted the said judgment.Tarun further argued that for a case to be cognizable, the punishment should be three years and upwards along with a fine, which is the case as regard Section 63, and thus the same should be construed to be a cognizable and non-bailable offence.Senior counsel Siddhartha Dave, representing accused however, justified the High Court's decision saying it has properly interpreted the law as laid down by the top court in the case of Rakesh Kumar..After considering the rival submissions, the bench referred to Section 63 and also part II of the First Schedule to the CrPC which defines cognizable and non-cognizable offences based on the punishment.It then noted that an offence will be non-cognizable only when it is punishable with imprisonment of less than three years. "Thus, for the offence under Section 63 of the Copyright Act, the punishment provided is imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than six months but which may extend to three years and with fine. Therefore, the Magistrate may sentence the accused for a period of three years also. Only in a case where the offence is punishable for imprisonment for less than three years or with fine only the offence can be said to be non-cognizable," the bench said adding that the language of the provision in Part II of First Schedule is very clear and that there is no ambiguity.Therefore, the top court ruled that the High Court committed a grave error in holding that the offence under Section 63 of the Copyright Act is a noncognizable offence."Thereby the High Court has committed a grave error in quashing and setting aside the criminal proceedings and the FIR. Therefore, the impugned judgment and order passed by the High Court quashing the criminal proceedings/FIR under Section 63 of the Copyright Act deserves to be quashed and set aside," the apex court concluded.The matter was, therefore, remanded to the High Court with a directive to consider it afresh..[Read Judgment]