Delhi High Court Rules in OpenAI's Favour in ANI Copyright Case, Says AI Training Does Not Infringe Copyright

In a landmark ruling for the artificial intelligence industry, the Delhi High Court has held that OpenAI's use of news agency ANI's content to train the AI models behind ChatGPT does not amount to copyright infringement.

The decision marks the first substantive judicial finding in India on whether AI companies can use copyrighted news content to train large language models without obtaining a licence, an issue that is also at the centre of lawsuits involving OpenAI in the United States and Canada.

ANI had filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in November 2024, alleging that the company used its published news reports without permission to train ChatGPT. The news agency also claimed that the chatbot generated fabricated stories while attributing them to ANI.

However, Justice Amit Bansal ruled that ANI had failed to establish that ChatGPT memorised or reproduced its copyrighted news reports when responding to user queries.

The court further held that OpenAI's storage of ANI's articles for training its AI models falls under the fair-dealing exemption for research provided under India's Copyright Act and therefore does not infringe the news agency's copyright.

The ruling is significant because it addresses one of the biggest legal questions surrounding generative AI: whether companies developing large language models can use publicly available copyrighted material for training purposes without seeking permission from rights holders.

OpenAI has consistently argued in courts across multiple jurisdictions that AI models learn statistical patterns from large datasets rather than storing or reproducing individual works. Copyright owners, including publishers, authors and news organisations, have countered that using their material without licences deprives them of revenue and violates intellectual property rights.

The Delhi High Court's decision provides an early legal endorsement of AI training under Indian copyright law, although the broader debate is far from settled. Similar cases against OpenAI and other AI companies continue in several countries, where courts are examining whether AI training qualifies as fair use or other copyright exceptions.

For India's rapidly growing AI ecosystem, the judgment could become an important precedent, particularly as developers increasingly rely on large datasets containing publicly available text to train generative AI models.

The ruling also comes at a time when global publishers are negotiating licensing agreements with AI companies while governments worldwide continue to examine how copyright law should apply to artificial intelligence.