By Sangeet Duchane (Ma Prem Sangeet)
A court in the European Union recently
upheld rulings of lower tribunals (not courts) that had allowed OSHO as a
trademark for OIF in the EU only. In arguing for this approval, OIF claimed
that OSHO has nothing to do with meditation, it is just a brand.
While many of us are offended by the
underlying sentiment of this, from a purely legal point of view, OIF is
correct. And let us rejoice that they are
right and that they have admitted this on the record. The trademark approval
means that OIF can use OSHO as a brand for goods and services that OIF owns or
legally controls. A trademark has nothing to do with meditation or the teachings
of a spiritual master, as OIF has admitted.
So, the question is, what does OIF own
or control?
Q: Does this decision mean that OIF
owns Osho’s intellectual rights, such as copyrights?
A: Of course not. Does anyone seriously
think that if a company has a brand that uses the name of an historical person
like George Washington, Nelson Mandela, or Winston Churchill they somehow
magically own the property of that person? Does the owner of a George
Washington Savings and Loan brand magically own Mt. Vernon, George Washington’s
residence? Of course not. This is just a brand; it has nothing to do with
ownership of any kind of property of any historical person.
Was the ownership of Osho’s copyrights
discussed in the case? Yes, it was, in the context of deciding if the name of a
spiritual leader could be a TM. Did the trademark tribunal have jurisdiction to
rule on copyright ownership? No, it didn’t. It was a glorified government
office with jurisdiction over trademarks, not a court.
In fact, the process of the trademark
proceedings weakened any legal claim OIF might have to copyright ownership. OIF
has used three separate and contradictory arguments as to why it claims to own
the copyrights. The first attempt was to claim that Osho signed the rights
directly over to RFI, the US organization controlled by Sheela. But there were
no original documents to prove this and no living person who could authenticate
photocopies.
So, OIF came up with a new story. The
new story was that Osho hadn’t signed over rights to RFI, as OIF had claimed
for years. They now claimed Osho had signed a power of attorney giving Sheela
the power to transfer rights, and she
transferred them to RFI. But OIF didn’t have originals of these alleged documents
either. So, they brought in Philip Toelkes (Niren), who testified that his
memory of documents created 30+ years ago was so exact that he could verify
these photocopies—which could easily have been tampered with—were exact copies
of the original documents. OIF’s opponents naturally challenged this claim.
In an attempt to issue a coup de grace on the ownership issues,
OIF then introduced an alleged will of Osho. Toelkes again came in to testify.
He claimed that, though he was not licensed to practice law in India and did
not know Indian law, he had drafted the will for Osho and could testify that
Michael O’Byrne (Jayesh) and John Andrews (Amrito) had witnessed Osho’s
signature.
The will was submitted to forensic
experts, and four experts to date have found that the “signature” on the “will”
is an exact copy of a signature found on the cover of an Osho book from the
1970s. No two signatures of any living person are ever exactly the same, yet
these are exactly the same, meaning the signature is forged. Further, we all
know that Osho’s signature changed over time. In the weakness of his last
months, his signature was very different than it had been in the 1970s. In
short, the “will” was found by the experts to be a pretty blatant forgery.
OIF quickly withdrew the will. When a
police inquiry in India ordered OIF to produce the original of the will, Mukesh
Sarda testified that Nirvano (formerly Vivek) had destroyed the original. Those
of us who were in Pune at the time and living and working in Lao Tzu know that
Nirvano did not have access to documents relating to Osho at that time. But
even if that story was in any way credible, Nirvano died before Osho, and if
she had destroyed the will, they would simply have had Osho sign another. If
they’re claiming that they didn’t know the will was destroyed until after Osho
died, then how would they know Nirvano was the person who destroyed it? How would
they know Osho didn’t destroy it? And why did they submit a will to a legal
tribunal if they knew the will could not be executed without an original? In
short, the will, even if it had been authentic, would never have had any legal
value if no original existed at the time of Osho’s death. Toelkes would have
known this, but the people at OIF tried to mislead the tribunal anyway. Like
all the stories of this group of people, nothing in this mess holds together or
makes sense.
In the process of creating this absurd
story, Philip Toelkes has destroyed whatever credibility he might have had to
verify documents. If he takes the stand in any court considering copyrights, he
will be under oath and will be questioned about his testimony on the “will”
under penalty of perjury. Even if he might be willing to perjure himself about
the “will,” the forensic findings would undermine his credibility on the
authentication of any document.
This means that OIF cannot validate the
photocopies of “copyright assignments” it has tried to use as original
documents for decades. OIF admitted that their first theory was not true and
now cannot prove their second, because their witness has lost all credibility.
They’ve admitted their third try, the “will,” was never valid. As a result, OIF’s
claim to copyright ownership has never been weaker or less plausible.
Q: Did Osho own rights in the centers
that used his name or in the meditation techniques he created?
A: Absolutely not. Osho never signed
any kind of agreement with any center, except the original Jeevan Jagruti
Kendra in India, many years ago, and no original of that document exists. Osho
asked people to start centers or agreed to their requests, and he asked them to
use his name. People did that out of love for him, and they accepted as much of
his guidance as they chose while he was alive out of love for him. It was all
about meditation, and nothing about a brand.
Once Osho was out of the body, people
continued to run centers inspired by his teachings, as they understood those
teachings, and by their own inner guidance. The goods and services, such as
programs, groups, meditations, and so on that people developed and have
continued to develop have always belonged to them. They have never belonged to
Osho.
Osho put his meditation techniques into
the public domain around 40 years ago. Nothing can ever take them out of the
public domain. This was in the tradition of the great masters of the past who
created vipassana, Zen techniques, and so on, for the good of humanity. Osho
never assigned the rights in any meditation technique to anyone, and freely
gave thousands of people permission to use the meditations, who have taught
thousands of others without any legal agreements.
Q: Does this decision mean that OIF can
force people to follow OIF’s ideas about 24-karat Osho, as OIF claimed in their
statement?
A: No, of course not. The decision
wasn’t about meditation or Osho’s teachings. It was only about a brand.
In the past OIF has claimed that
ownership of a brand would mean that it could control the content of Osho’s
teaching. OIF claimed that it could take legal control of centers and create a
franchise and that it could own the center’s intellectual property rights.
This is nonsense. Even Osho never owned
rights in the centers, so no one using his Zen title as a brand could magically
do so. A trademark is only about a
brand, as OIF has admitted. OIF owns its own goods and services or what it owns
through valid voluntary legal assignments directly to OIF—nothing else.
OIF currently has control of a brand,
in the EU only, which no longer includes the UK. This means they can object to
how the word osho is used in
marketing in that area. It means nothing
else.
Q: So, what’s next?
A: You are free to choose what you want
to do. No one can be forced to submit to OIF’s control in any way. There can be
no enforced “24-karat” interpretation of the historical person Osho. Ideas can never be owned under any
circumstances. Expression of ideas
can be owned in the form of copyrights. Brands, that have nothing to do with
ideas, can be owned as trademarks. But ideas, interpretations of ideas, can never be owned, even by the person who
first expresses an idea. No one knows this better than Osho, who often uses and
interprets the ideas of others.
Centers can voluntarily choose to join
an OIF franchise in the EU if they want to, of course. They could always have
done this. Caveat: Anyone considering this kind of agreement should have all
legal documents reviewed by a very good attorney who is representing your
interests and not OIF’s. Make sure you are not signing over ownership of your
intellectual property rights, that OIF cannot take over the center or
institute, that OIF cannot take over finances, and, for example, take away your
retirement benefits. If OIF claims you have signed over rights, have all
documents checked by your legal counsel. OIF has a history of misrepresenting
this.
If you do not want your center or
institute, etc. in the EU to be controlled by the people in OIF, the people
implicated in the forgery of Osho’s will, keep in mind that OSHO is only a brand. No one can ever own an
historical person, so no one can stop you from identifying Osho the historical
person as the inspiration for your work; no one can control your ideas or steal
your intellectual property rights. You need to consult a good local attorney to
find out how you can deal with the issue of a brand. It may be different in
different countries in the EU. So, you need to check carefully.
It may be enough, for example, to
change the “Osho ABC Meditation Center,” to the “ABC Meditation Center, inspired
by the teachings of the mystic Osho.” But you need to ask an attorney in your
country for the details. In some places, if you used “Osho” before the date
that OIF registered it as a TM in the EU, you may be exempt from the trademark.
Again, you need to check.
So, be careful, check everything,
protect yourselves, and keep in mind this is only a brand. OIF has chosen to
have nothing to do with meditation, but the teachings of the historical mystic
Osho are all about meditation and many
of us will all carry that on.
