The Delhi High Court dismissed allegations of copyright infringement against OpenAI in a lawsuit filed by Asian News International (ANI), publishers' bodies, and the Indian music industry. The court ruled that OpenAI's use of copyrighted material to train ChatGPT's large language models falls under exceptions in Section 52 of the Copyright Act, rejecting ANI's plea for an interim injunction against the AI company, according to livemint.com.
Justice Amit Bansal held that storing ANI's content during AI training does not constitute copyright infringement, noting that ChatGPT's outputs are not similar to ANI's original works. ANI had claimed ChatGPT reproduces parts of its reports verbatim and attributes fabricated statements to the agency, which it said harmed its reputation. OpenAI denied these allegations, arguing that its AI training is a transformative process and that its models are not trained in India, per inc42.com.
This ruling is India's first major copyright case involving generative AI and sets a precedent for how AI training data is treated under Indian copyright law. The court's decision aligns with global debates on AI and copyright, where transformative use and the nature of AI-generated content remain key issues. The judgment also highlights challenges faced by content creators in protecting their work from AI systems trained on publicly available data.
The court emphasized that granting an interim injunction could cause irreparable harm to OpenAI and the public. ANI failed to establish a prima facie case warranting such relief. The ruling was issued on July 24, 2026, marking a significant legal milestone for AI companies operating in India, as reported by livemint.com.