Catch up with the Kindle case through these court orders: [ 2026 | 2023 | 2020 ]
The intermediary status of Amazon in the Kindle ecosystem is being challenged and may be examined during a trail before a District Commercial Court of South Delhi. The case allegedly accuses Amazon of unauthorized sale of a Kindle version of a book but the company claims it is just an intermediary and therefore entitled to safe harbor protections under the Section 79 of the IT Act.
But can it make the same argument it made in a book piracy case when it comes to alleged “unauthorised” hosting and distribution of the digital versions of a book globally in Kindle format, which may’ve involved using Amazon’s own converting/publishing tools? The future court proceedings could answer such questions as the Delhi HC has refused Amazon’s petition to be deleted as a defendant and made it remain a party to the case.
On September 30, the Delhi HC dismissed Amazon’s plea petition challenging dismissal of its application before the District Trial Court seeking deletion from a copyright infringement case involving Vasundhara Prakash’s “Fragments: You and I” book that was listed on Amazon marketplace in 2018. Now, the book is no longer listed on Amazon.
In order to examine the intermediary status of Amazon, the court noted that the “nature, extent and scope of [Amazon’s] role in the suit would require evidence.” However, Justice AJ Bhambhani clarified that a trial court’s previous observation calling Amazon a “direct infringer of copyright,” an argument based on Amazon’s alleged involvement in converting the petitioner’s book into the Kindle format, cannot be treated as conclusionary evidence against the tech giant.
Some background of the case: The petitioner claimed that in May 2018 Vasundhara Prakash’s “Fragments: You and I,” (which she alleged was initially listed on Amazon’s marketplace) found its way on Amazon’s International’s Kindle platform. A few sequences of events, based on the court orders from 2020 and 2026:
- Prakash had entered into a publishing agreement with Half Baked Beans Literature Private Limited on December 4, 2017, but revoked her authorization after five months, on April 11, 2018, after some disputes over defects among the author and the book publishers.
- The very next day, Vasundhara Prakash apparently notified Amazon India, calling on Amazon “not to deal in or list the book.”
- Next day, Amazon had replied assuring her the book would be removed.
- However, despite the email, the author alleged the book’s listing stayed up, and that the book was subsequently “converted into digital form and was made available on global platforms i.e., www.amazon.com and www.amazon.uk. being sold at US$ and GB£ price point.”
- Disputing this, Amazon India says it deleted its listing and claimed that it had no role in the Kindle version.
- Amazon India further said that the book was available in Kindle format only for just 12 days, between May 21 and June 2, 2018, earning estimated royalties of “about 06 Rupees and 17 paise.”
In January 2019, when Amazon India invoked the intermediary status, the trial court then had allowed Amazon’s plea and deleted it from the list of parties to this case. The court did this after accepting its claim to be a mere intermediary and that it had already taken down the listing.
Later, the author, Vasundhara Prakash, challenged the deletion before the High Court of Delhi claiming that Amazon India has participated and assisted in unauthorized publication and sale on Amazon US and Amazon UK platforms doubting its role of a mere intermediary and also, it did not remove the listing within the stipulated period 36 hours according to the then applicable Intermediary Guidelines under the IT Act.
The author challenged that trail court order, and in a judgment dated February 19, 2020, Justice Prathiba M. Singh held that “the Trial Court has taken up the matter in a piecemeal manner” and then restored Amazon India as a party to the current lawsuit directing the District Court to decide the same. Justice Prathiba Singh also observed:
“A mere statement by [Amazon India] that it did not make the digital version of the book available to its global platforms cannot be straight away accepted. The fact that the digital version of the book was made available on the Kindle platform shows that a deeper enquiry would be required. The same would be a question of trial.”
The 2020 order also notes two specific alleged violations:
- Amazon “did not take down the listing within the mandatory period of 72 hours from receipt of the notice,” and that it
- Amazon “had passed the book to its global group companies for listing the same in its digital version on Kindle devices.”
Amazon countered the first allegation arguing that IT Rules 2011 and under the Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, 2011 and a clarification dated March 18, 2013 issued by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, “Intermediaries are only required to acknowledge the complaint within 36 hours and redressal can take place within a period of one month,” Amazon said, as per the court order.
The 2023’s trial court noted Amazon as a ‘direct infringer.’ Relying on the arguments made on behalf of Plaintiff Vasundhara Prakash regarding Amazon’s “active involvement in converting the plaintiff’s work into the Kindle format and offering it for sale on its Kindle platform elevates it beyond the role of a passive intermediary,” the trial court then found:
“[Amazon India’s] role as a direct infringer of copyright, coupled with its responsibility for remedying the infringement related to the Kindle format, necessitates its presence in the proceedings.
The court further underlined that “[Amazon India’s] attempt to evade liability by claiming intermediary status and shifting the burden of policing its website is unfounded and cannot be accepted.”
It also said that the intermediary status under the IT Act doesn’t automatically shield the platform for the liability of alleged copyright infringement. The court further stated:
“…an intermediary’s actions, such as actively promoting or deriving financial benefit from infringing content, can elevate it beyond the role of a mere passive intermediary and establish direct liability.”
The District Judge then allowed Vasundhara Prakash to amend her claims and dismissed Amazon India’s application for deletion form array of defendants. Amazon India challenged the order of the District Court in 2024 before the Hon’ble High Court of Delhi in a petition under Article 227 of Constiution of India. Hearing the petition finally on September 30, 2026, Justice Anup Bhambhani observed that Amazon could not be deleted from the suit since the nature of its role “would require evidence to be led“. However, he also observed that certain observations of the District Court relating to the role of Amazon India to be “misconceived and misplaced.”
How Kindle books actually get made and why it matters here. Amazon’s own documentation shows the Kindle pipeline is not passive hosting. The e-books had to pass through Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), a platform where the publisher or self-publisher will upload the content that is to be published globally.
Amazon’s proprietary Kindle Create tool converts a DOC or DOCX manuscript into a “reflowable” eBook, handling typesetting, table-of-contents generation and formatting, and exports the file in Kindle Package Format (KPF) for publishing to the Kindle store. Amazon has even offered conversion directly to consumers since at least 2015, as TIME reported, its Kindle Convert application “turns print books into digital versions that work on Amazon’s Kindle devices’ software.
As per Amazon’s documentation, if this is how Kindle formats lands up on Amazon, then it raises a few important questions that the future court proceedings should give an answer:
How will Amazon claim its intermediary status IF Amazon is involved in the conversion/publication/distribution process and to what extent? This question needs to be answered to determine the intermediary status of Amazon in Kindle context.
Section 79 of the IT Act doesn’t give legal immunity to Amazon India or any other platforms that may have the functions of an intermediary. For some context on the intermediary liability, under the Section 79(2)(b) IT Act, to claim safe harbor protection, an intermediary should not:
- Initiate the transmission.
- Select the receiver of the transmission.
- Select or modify the information in the transmission.
- Fail to observe due diligence under the IT Act and other guidelines.
So, under this framework, , in order to take the defence of being an intermediary, Amazon India will have to prove that it had followed all the required and applicable statutory rules and guidelines, and its role was squarely within the law. A few more questions that the future proceedings could answer:
- Is Amazon responsible for e-books published on its platform using Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) or Kindle Create tool/other tools (if possible) to convert a book into a Kindle version and upload it to Amazon’s servers? Will that depend on who uploads/initiates the action?
- When Amazon lists such books on its common marketplace, can it take defence of being a mere intermediary?
- Does Amazon require to check the authenticity/validity of the copyright agreements before publishing/uploading then on its marketplace? Does it have an obligation under the IT Rules?
- When an author/publisher claims that they have revoked the authorization/consent/contract, does/should Amazon be liable for manual/automatic distribution of the Kindle version globally? Shouldn’t/wouldn’t this break its intermediary status?
- Will/should Amazon be considered as an intermediary for “hosting” the digital/Kindle version of the book? What is the involvement of Amazon in this process of “publishing or self-publishing” businesses, especially when it already controls the proprietary formats for Kindle versions?
Also Read:
- Amazon claims safe-harbour protection at Karnataka HC over a book piracy case
- SP Jain college moves to Amazon Kindle, but who owns the textbooks?
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