India Proposes Statutory Licensing For AI Training

In 2026 India's Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) released a white paper proposing statutory blanket licensing to let AI companies train on copyrighted works by paying fixed fees into a central fund. The proposal would create a statutory body to distribute royalties and mandate dataset transparency and opt-out rights. If adopted, it aims to balance creator compensation with AI innovation while preserving the public domain.