Has it ever happened with you that you have an idea or design about something but didn’t know what to do with it and later on you see that the thought is used by someone else for their business? To solve this knowledge gap, Indian government has come up with a plan to enlighten the young minds about their rights. The government is planning to come out with a series of comic books to increase awareness about the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) programme, especially among children and generation next.
Intellectual property rights are basically the rights given to persons over the creations of their minds. They usually give the creator an exclusive right over the use of his/her creation for a certain period of time
The government has initiated discussions with the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), one of the 17 specialised agencies of the United Nations, which was created in 1967 to encourage creative activity and promote the protection of IPR throughout the world.
According to a HindustanTimes report, a government official said, “The commerce and industry ministry had launched an awareness programme called “KIDS Nook” where it first came out with comic flyers and banners, and now wants to take it forward through a series of these comics”. He added that WIPO has been contacted to share some of their content with them which will be used as a ready reckoner for this project. WIPO has earlier published some material in a very reader-friendly format and India is looking forward to have a similar product. Once the theme is finalised then the government will confirm the cartoonist and the writer. Whether the comics will be available for free or how will its distribution work out is yet to be looked at.
Though the government is yet to work out the name of the protagonist, an ‘IP Man’ or ‘GI girl’ or ‘Design Girl’ may be the one finally teaching you about IPR. All the three names are with reference to the three major categories under IPR — design, geographical indications (GI) and intellectual property.