Leading Indian artist Anita Dube accused of ‘intellectual theft’ after using protest poem in Delhi gallery show

A row over copyright infringement and art market ethics has erupted in the Indian art world, after the prominent contemporary artist and curator Anita Dube was publicly accused of intellectual theft by the poet-activist Aamir Aziz for using his verses in a series of painted sculptures.

Four works featuring lines from Aziz’s popular poem Sab Yaad Radha Jaayega (everything will be remembered), all made between 2023 and 2024, were exhibited and offered for sale at Dube’s solo exhibition Three Storey House, which ran from 15 March to 19 April at Vadehra Art Gallery in New Delhi, one of India’s leading commercial galleries.

Aziz penned the poem during the 2019 anti-CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) protests in India—nationwide demonstrations against a series of bills proposed by India’s union government, which were widely deemed discriminatory against some minorities.

In a social media post published on 20 April, Aziz said: “This is my poem, written in velvet cloth, another carved in wood, hung inside a commercial white cube space, renamed, rebranded, and resold at an enormous price without ever telling me… This is not conceptual borrowing. This is theft. This is erasure. This is the entitled section of the art world doing what it does best, extracting, consuming, profiting while pretending it’s radical.” Aziz also points to the “irony” that Dube’s actions defy the verse’s radical message of solidarity and resistance: “The poem raged against injustice. Anita Dube turned it into a luxury commodity.”

In a statement sent to The Art Newspaper, Dube says: “I am replying to this social media trial initiated by Aamir Aziz with sadness. I have been in love with Sab Yaad Rakha Jayega, especially some lines which swirled around in my head like dervishes.”

“The intent of quoting Aamir Aziz’s poem was to celebrate them,” she continues. “I have quoted Martin Luther King and bell hooks, and others in the same spirit in this exhibition and elsewhere.” As soon as she received the complaint, she adds, “I immediately put the works not for sale”.

Aziz said in the post that he was unaware the works existed until notified by a friend who visited the exhibition. In screenshots accompanying Aziz’s post, two works—Big Zebra and Small Zebra—appear to have been retitled to acknowledge his authorship, while another work Old Zebra (Disappeared Poem) remains unchanged. A fourth work has been titled since its execution After Amir Aziz.

Are there legal grounds for a complaint?

Aziz says he is presently seeking legal counsel to resolve the matter. The foundation for his claim that Dube’s use of his words is an act of theft falls under Indian artistic copyright law, as defined by the Copyright Act of 1957. Aimed at protecting the rights of creative professionals, including writers, musicians, artists, filmmakers, it ensures that the creator has exclusive rights to decide how their work is reproduced, distributed and displayed. It also offers them the moral rights or credit whenever and wherever the work is used.

“Copyright for a work of art exists while the artist is alive, and 60 years after his/her death,” says Roshnek Dhalla, a partner and the Indian law firm Khaitan & Co. “So if you are using someone else’s creation in your work, you must seek permission, give them credit and offer royalty in case of commercial gains on the final product.”

While Dube does give Aziz credit for his poem—on a caption sheet of exhibited works, since there were no wall captions—she, by her own admission, did not seek permission, telling The Art Newspaper that her choice to not consult Aziz about using his words was an “ethical lapse”.

“However I reached out and called him, apologised, and offered to correct this by remuneration. Aamir instead chose to send a legal notice, and then I had to go to a lawyer as well… I hope to resolve this issue in a fair manner.”

This is not the first high-profile instance of copyright infringement in Indian art. In 2023, for example, St+ Art Foundation accused Akko General Insurance of violating copyright when the company used one of the foundation’s murals created in collaboration with the Mexican artist Paola Delfin for an advertisement hoarding. St+Art’s ownership was upheld by the Delhi High Court, and the company was asked to take down the hoarding and all social media posts featuring the work, noting that its intention was “wholly commercial”.

“An exception to the rule is fair use,” Dhalla says. Fair use allows parts of a text to be used without copyright infringement depending on several factors such as purpose and character of the use. Criticism and commentary, news reporting, teaching and research often fall under the ambit of fair use.

Indeed Aziz said in his social media post that he makes an exception for use of his words without permission for non-commercial purposes such as “a protest, a rally, a people’s uprising”. A high profile example of this was when Roger Waters, of the popular rock band Pink Floyd, recited Aziz’s poem at a protest in London in 2020.

As Dube’s works featuring Aziz’s poem were intended for sale, they do not appear to fall under the definition of fair use. In fact, one of Dube’s earlier works, Intifada (2023), also using Aziz’s poem, has been exhibited at several art fairs by Vadehra, as well as having featured in a Mumbai group exhibition in 2023 at the Kamalnayan Bajaj art gallery. The gallery’s director Roshini Vadehra tells The Art Newspaper that Intifada has not been sold yet, and that all sales from the exhibition have been put on hold until the dispute is resolved. “The works were immediately taken off the market and were not for sale,” she says. “The exhibition [stayed] on as… the legal representatives on both sides were in discussion with each other.”

The gallery said in a statement: “We have been in touch with Aamir Aziz and his legal representatives for over a month. We immediately ensured that the works Aamir Aziz has concerns with were not offered for sale. We hope that the discussions that are ongoing between Aamir Aziz and Anita Dube can be resolved in an amicable and constructive manner.”