Indian Lyricists Demand Credit For Their Bollywood Songs Online

Lyricists and poets in India are demanding their basic rights- credit for the songs that they write. However, a month after going public with their demand, the writers are yet to get a response from the digital platforms streaming these movie songs without any credit for the lyricist. The Screenwriters’ Association has written a letter to the music labels demanding credit for writers and some Bollywood writers have also collaborated for a song that talks of their demands.

While it is norm for a song to be known by the lyricist’s name in the western world, things are quite opposite in India. Not only are songs mainly known by the names of stars featuring in the video, lyricists and writers often struggle to even find a mention in the credits. Gaurav Solanki, Varun Grover, Swamnand Kirkire, Kausar Munir and Neelesh Mishra, among 15 lyricists, have come up with a song about it. A month later, there has been no response on the demands. Attempts to reach out to music labels for this story remained unanswered as well.

Asked if the writers plan on any legal action, Swanand says, “We were hoping it would get a response. We are waiting for them to get back. We will do what we can (and decide upon any legal steps, if at all, only later).”

Why are credits missing for writers?

Most writers believe it is mere carelessness and not any strategy against the writers. It is not as if the lyricists are not named at all. Music companies and labels like Sony Music, Zee Music, Tips and T Series – some of the companies owning the rights for popular Hindi songs – all display inconsistent behavior in this aspect. They credit some lyricists and skip others.

Writer-actor Swanand says, “All these companies on Youtube and streaming platforms like Gaana and Spotify – sometimes they give credit and sometimes they do not. The problem is you cannot find good results when you search songs by writers’ names. That happens because there is no system in place for crediting the lyricist.”

Why are songs known by actors’ name in India?

Swanand says songs are often known by the actors’s name as they are visible – actors are the ones we see onscreen in Indian films, not singers, musicians or writers. “Hindi cinema is all about that disguise, it is supposed to look like the actor is singing and not the singer – we thrive on playback here. We (artists other than actors) are supposed to be hidden. But that is not the case anymore, people know it is not just actors (doing all the job by themselves). But that is not the case anymore. We need to change the system and introduce proper credits for writers as well.”

The loss for writers

When there is no or bad search result for an artist’s name, his/her work cannot be objectively evaluated in the context of online reception. It may not be directly related, but the slant link takes you eventually to the payment a writer lands for a song he/she writes. However, the writers insist credit means respect for their work, more than anything else.

Credit De Do Yaar – a song by writers, for writers

Varun says that most streaming platforms credit “only the composers and singers”. Even legendary and famous writers like Gulzar are not given due credit and the credits are sometimes wrongly attributed.

About their latest campaign song -Credit De Do Yaar (Please give us our credits, friend), Swanand reveals it all began when they started talking about the credits for Dil Bechara songs and received a good response from fans online. “We then decided to do what we do best –write a song. Credit De Do Yaar . Varun and Kausar wrote it and I composed it with some help. Soon, we had 15 writers on board,” he adds.

However, this is not the first time Indian writers have had to fight for a mere mention and credit for the work they do. Earlier, poet-writer Sahir Ludhianvi had to put up a fight before popular radio channel Vividh Bharti started naming lyricists along with other artists while playing film songs.