A battle is raging in America’s Tinseltown. For the first time in 15 years, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) launched an industry-wide strike demanding fair pay and benefits rather than being treated like gig workers. In a spillover effect, writers guilds across the world united to fight back including India’s Screenwriters Association (SWA), which asked its members to stop work or not accept any new writing assignments on American films and series.

So, is a culture of collective bargaining — which has been a landmark hurrah of union power in Americ a’s film and television industry since the ‘30s — finally taking root in India’s screenwriting industry? 

Writers are trying to stay optimistic. Over the next few weeks, the SWA intends to invite studios and independent producers to the negotiating table to discuss a ‘Minimum Basic Contract’ — a set of basic principles on which a standard writer-producer agreement should be based — that could tilt the scales of a lopsided industry, where writer contracts are not so much negotiated as dictated by production houses.

Anjum Rajabali, veteran screenwriter an d member of SWA’s executive committee, says that the WGA strike has come as a stark reminder of longstanding and fresh challenges that screenwriters in India face. “The WGA contract comes up for renegotiation every three years but we haven’t even reached a stage where the union can negotiate a standard contract for its members. Here each writer has to deal with producers independently and the bargaining power is disproportionate,” rues Rajabali.

The reason the Hollywood pen down has created ripples here is because the corporations that the WGA is agitating against are the same ones whose subsidiaries Indian screenwriters are working for, such as Amazon, Hotstar, and Netflix. “If the outcome of the strike is favourable, its implications could empower our writers to stand up for their rights,” says Rajabali.

But wasn’t the advent of OTT platforms and demand for more content expected to tilt the balance in favour of writers? The frustration is palpable as Rajabali says: “Not only has that not happened, it’s only gotten worse with contracts becoming harsher. The first squeeze in the budget is always the writer’s fee.”

It’s a fight about money, of course, given the “undignified low fees” especially for new writers, but also about fair treatment — one-sided contracts, lack of credit guarantees, arbitrary termination clauses and difficult indemnity demands.

Saiwyn Quadras, a screenwriter with a string of successful films like ‘Mary Kom’ and ‘Neerja’, opened up about his brush with whimsical terminations. In one instance, Quadras spent a year rewriting three drafts for a film, going back and forth with the producer, only to be told that none of it would be considered as even the first draft. The contract further prevented him from approaching the SWA for issues.

“It said that I could only go to court, which is a daunting prospect. Not every writer has the money and resources to keep a legal fight going which makes SWA’s legal cell a crucial resource because they help us decode legalese and assist with lawyers or finances.”

Even the way fees are paid is a problem. “Writers’ fees are divided into so many tranches — depending on casting to release — that we could be waiting for two years and running our homes on 30-35% of the total remuneration due to us,” Quadras exclaims. “This is my state after delivering three hits. I wonder what happens with novices.”

Rajabali says one issue is that writers are made to sign a ‘release form’, a legal agreement that absolves production houses and studios of any legal obligations and leaves writers without any recourse if their work is plagiarized. Another major hurdle is credit. “The issue of credits isn’t about vanity or ego but crucial to a writer’s future career,” points out Rajabali, known for writing films like ‘Ghulam’, and ‘Raajneeti’ and advocating for the rights of Indian screenwriters since he co-founded the Progressive Writers Group in 2008.

“However, a clause in writer contracts allows the producer or platform the discretion to determine the final credits for a film or series and there are dozens of instances where a junior writer may have done 80% of the scripting, but a senior writer engaged for rewriting the script receives the top billing and exclusive credit. Sometimes, the junior writer gets credited as ‘researcher’ or ‘additional screenplay writer’ and sometimes may even have their names knocked off, which not only undermines their creative merit but also the compensation they’re entitled to,” he says, adding that often directors and producers demand undue writing credit even if they have only given feedback.

Bhavani Iyer, who has written the stories and screenplays for ‘Black’, ‘Lootera’, ‘Guzaarish’, says the issue is far from straightforward. “It’s not just about disparity in pay and credit between senior and junior writers; it’s also about the absence of a framework for redressal.”