Indian standards can determine whether a product may be sold, a building is safe, or a factory meets a mandatory rule. For years, many of those technical documents were available only for a fee. American technologist and public-domain activist Carl Malamud challenged that model by buying thousands of Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) documents, digitising them and publishing them online. His campaign did not produce a court ruling making every standard public domain, but it helped move BIS toward free online access to a substantial part of its catalogue.
What Indian Standards are—and why access matters
BIS is India’s national standards body. It develops and publishes technical specifications covering product safety and quality, manufacturing, construction, electrical and electronic equipment, food, consumer goods, testing methods, services, environmental controls and public-health requirements. The BIS describes its role and legal framework on its official website.
A standard becomes especially important when a statute, regulation or quality-control order makes compliance compulsory. In that situation, a manufacturer may be legally required to follow a document that is difficult or expensive to obtain. Law professor and lawyer Lawrence Liang described such documents as “invisible laws” underlying visible laws, a characterization reported by Scroll.
- Manufacturers need the exact specification to design and test products.
- Small businesses and start-ups can be disadvantaged when basic compliance information is paywalled.
- Students, researchers, journalists and consumers lose access to primary technical material.
- Lawyers and courts face avoidable barriers when regulations incorporate standards by reference.
- Public consultation is weaker when the technical rule behind a proposal cannot be readily read.
Who Carl Malamud is
Malamud is an American technologist, author and public-domain activist who founded Public.Resource.Org. His broader work has included publishing government records, court opinions, regulatory material, US Securities and Exchange Commission EDGAR data and patent information. He was not an Indian government official, and the Indian campaign was not his work alone.
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How the Indian campaign unfolded
Malamud’s effort combined purchases, digitisation, advocacy and litigation. Scroll reported that he spent $10,513—then described as about ₹6.15 lakh—buying more than 18,000 Indian Standards between February 2012 and May 2013.
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| April 11, 2013 | Malamud obtained a BIS Water Division DVD and posted the standards online. |
| June 3, 2013 | He obtained a more complete-set DVD and published the material for free, noncommercial use. |
| August 1, 2014 | BIS objected, citing copyright and the purchase terms attached to the DVDs. |
| 2014 | Malamud sent a written response arguing that public access was necessary for transparency and good governance. |
| 2015 | BIS rejected the campaign’s demands; Public.Resource.Org, Indian Kanoon founder Sushant Sinha and researcher Srinivas Kodali then pursued a public-interest petition in the Delhi High Court. |
| 2023 | Scroll reported that roughly 14,000 of nearly 21,000 standards were freely available online and that the petitioners withdrew after finding that BIS had published most of its standards. |
The chronology and correspondence are preserved in materials hosted by Public.Resource.Org, including Malamud’s response to BIS at this document. NALSAR also announced the open-access petition at its site.
What he actually did
- Bought source material: He paid BIS for DVDs containing thousands of standards.
- Digitised and published it: Public.Resource.Org uploaded PDFs and, for some documents, retyped or converted text into searchable XHTML suitable for mobile reading.
- Made a public-interest case: The campaign argued that mandatory technical rules should be inspectable by the people expected to obey them.
- Built an Indian coalition: He sought support from academics, lawyers, activists and public figures, and worked with Sinha and Kodali.
- Went to court: After letters and administrative advocacy failed, the group asked the Delhi High Court to require free or reasonably priced access.
The Indian partners and the “satyagraha” framing
The campaign’s Indian dimension matters. Sushant Sinha brought Indian Kanoon’s legal-information experience; Srinivas Kodali contributed research and civic-technology work; and Sam Pitroda helped connect Malamud with Indian technology and policy networks. Academics, lawyers and civil-society supporters supplied affidavits and public backing.
Malamud also described the effort through Gandhian satyagraha: nonviolent resistance, public persuasion, moral pressure and a willingness to bear personal costs. That was a campaign strategy and political language, not a judicial finding that every standard was legally free to copy.
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The copyright dispute
Malamud’s argument
- When a standard is incorporated into binding law, people should be able to read it.
- Transparency and the constitutional right to information weigh against inaccessible legal requirements.
- Public access need not prevent BIS from selling authenticated copies, annotated editions or value-added services.
BIS’s argument
- BIS treated its publications as copyrighted material.
- Buyers accepted contractual restrictions when purchasing the DVDs.
- Republishing complete standards without permission infringed copyright.
- Sales help support drafting, review, translation, updating, publication and administration.
BIS set out its position in its Delhi High Court synopsis at this filing. The policy question is whether those costs require charging the public to read a technical rule that the state has made compulsory, or whether public funding and other services can support standards work while the rule itself remains accessible.
What the court case did—and did not—decide
The available account does not show a final Delhi High Court merits judgment declaring all Indian Standards uncopyrightable or ordering BIS to release its entire catalogue. Scroll reported that the petitioners withdrew after BIS had already placed most standards online. The exact administrative timeline and legal mechanism behind that expansion are not clearly documented in the available public material.
Accordingly, the strongest defensible description is that Malamud’s campaign helped produce a major practical and policy change—not that he single-handedly won a universal legal right to free standards.
Are Indian standards free today?
As of August 18, 2026, BIS advertises online access and downloads through its website, but the catalogue is mixed. Some entries display Download; others display Buy. BIS’s March 23, 2026 website update also continues to provide standards-access tools.
BIS’s instructions say users should register before accessing and downloading standards. The current process is:
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- Open the BIS website or standards portal.
- Choose “Download Indian Standards” or “Know your Standard.”
- Search by Indian Standard number or keyword.
- Create or use a registered account if prompted, following BIS’s download instructions.
- Check whether the listing says Download or Buy.
- Confirm the edition, revision, amendments and reaffirmation or review date before relying on it.
A BIS handbook says standards are available online but registration is required: BIS handbook. Catalogue pages at this address and this technical-department listing demonstrate why “all standards are free” is too broad a claim.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Free access is not the same as public domain
Price and copyright are separate questions. A document may be free to view, free to download for personal use, or available for free noncommercial use without being free to republish, sell, modify or mirror.
A BIS notice on standards under compulsory certification says some documents offered for free viewing remain copyright-protected and restrict downloading, printing, image storage or redistribution: BIS notice. Check the terms attached to the particular document before incorporating it into a database, commercial product or public archive.
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How to verify a standard before using it
- Edition: Search engines may surface a superseded version.
- Amendments: Locate every amendment or corrigendum, not just the base PDF.
- Legal status: Confirm that the relevant government order actually makes the standard compulsory.
- Identity: Do not substitute an ISO or IEC edition when an Indian regulation requires a specific IS edition.
- Authenticity: Treat Public.Resource.Org or other mirrors as historical and research resources; verify the current text through BIS.
- Reuse: A “free view” link does not automatically grant redistribution rights.
- Accessibility: Check whether the PDF is searchable and usable with assistive technology.
For an official copy that is still listed for purchase, BIS provides sales information at its sales page. Indian Kanoon can help locate legislation and case law, but it is not a substitute for the current BIS standard. Government quality-control orders are essential when deciding whether compliance is mandatory.
Why the campaign still matters
The dispute exposed a recurring rule-of-law problem: technical regulation can be legally binding while remaining practically invisible. BIS’s later free-access programme materially improved the situation for Indian manufacturers, students, researchers and the public, even though coverage, registration, edition control and reuse terms still vary.
The unresolved policy choice is broader than one activist or one catalogue. Governments can fund standards development publicly and keep incorporated requirements readable, while standards bodies recover costs through certification, training, authenticated copies, data services and professional support. Whatever model is chosen, people should not be expected to comply with a technical rule they cannot reasonably inspect.
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