Zee is all set to take on T-Series with its own music label

Reams have already been devoted to covering the royalty issue between music company TSeries and a bevy of singers and music composers Recent instances include the muchpublicised controversy that broke out when actorturnedproducer Abhay Deol decided to take on TSeries by supporting the rights of the music director trio Shankar Ehsaan and LoySonu Nigam and right Sunidhi Chauhan were shown the door upon demanding royalty their songs were then rerecorded with other singersSimilarly Sonu Nigam and Sunidhi Chauhan were shown the door upon demanding royalty their songs were then rerecorded with other singers For quite some time now the industry seems to have been unable to resolve this conflictBut it looks like a solution is not so far away If sources are to be believed Zee is all set to take on TSeries with its own music label Whatrsquos more this label is apparently pro musicians and is considering giving them royaltyLyricist SameerSays a source ldquoThe chairman of Essel Group Subhash Chandra called for a meeting with the industryrsquos top music directors lyricists and producers where they were informed about Zeersquos music label He stressed on the fact that the company will seriously consider the amended copyright clause that deals with paying royalty to music composers and lyricistsrdquoSinger Kailash KherThis secret meeting is said to have included director Vikramaditya Motwane filmmaker Vipul Shah actorfilmmaker Arbaaz Khan and some leading music directors from the industry When informed about this Bhushan Kumar of TSeries said ldquoMusic is a big market and recently it has incurred us losses so we have now diversified into film production Besides we have always welcomed healthy competition from big namesrdquoKailash Kher is happy with this development He says ldquoSome people are not ready to give singers their due but there are a few good people in the industry who follow the rules We respect Zeersquos ideologyrdquoEssel Group chairman Subhash Chandra andMusic director Ehsaan NooraniSonu Nigam who has been fighting the royalty battle for a long time now sounds relieved He says ldquoFor a musician like me who is loved and appreciated by people it is difficult to accept a scenario where an autocratic unrepentant set of people snatch away my songs and make others sing them So this news is a breath of fresh airrdquoThe new music label has apparently acquired music rights of a few films and this list could include Shah Rukh Khan starrer Happy New Year Akshay Kumar starrer Holiday and a film being made by Vashu BhagnaniLyricist Sameer who was present at the meeting says ldquoZee is reviving its music label and this is great for us because they have promised to follow the new copyright law which will give singers royalty and performance rightsrdquoBhushan Kumar chairman TSeriesMusic composer Ehsaan Noorani who also attended the meeting points out that healthy completion is always welcome ldquoItrsquos good to have more music companies distributing and acquiring music Copyright laws apply to everyone but their implementation by record companies is taking a long time A lot of administration and monitoring work needs to be done for it to be smoothly executedrdquoPunit Goenka CEO of Zee Entertainment remained unavailable for comment Anurag Bedi business head Zee Entertainment said ldquoWhen the time is right we will surely comment on thisrdquoWith inputs by Bharati Dubey