Music Royalties in Nepal: How Composers and Singers Can Protect Their Tracks

The rights map: authors and performers are different owners

Nepalese music carries two layers of rights, and every royalty conversation starts by identifying which layer is speaking. The authors' layer — the musical work and its lyrics: the composer and lyricist own the composition's rights (reproduction, distribution, broadcast/public performance, communication to the public, adaptation), running life + 50 years. The related-rights layer — the performance and the recording: performers (singers, session musicians) hold rights in their performances; producers of sound recordings hold rights in the fixation — each for 50 years from fixation or publication.

The practical consequence: a hit song pays multiple owners — the writer's share (composition) and the performer/producer's share (recording) are different royalties, collected from different licenses. Nepalese disputes (and unpaid royalties) usually trace to the parties treating these as one pot.

The royalty sources — and who owes what

Broadcast (FM radio, TV): public-performance/broadcast royalties to authors, and related-right royalties to performers/producers for the recordings played — historically the least-collected source in Nepal, and the collection societies' core mission. Streaming and digital platforms: reproduction and communication rights; platform licensing runs through the labels/distributors and, increasingly, the societies. YouTube: Content ID and licensing channels plus the platform's own royalty mechanics — where much Nepalese music actually earns. Live performance: public-performance royalties for covers (venues/events using others' songs) and the performer's fee for originals. Synchronisation (ads, films, serials): negotiated licensing to authors AND the recording's owners — Nepal's ad and film industries are a growing royalty source that most artists under-document.

The collection infrastructure: Music Royalty Collection Society Nepal (authors' side) and the Performers' Society of Nepal (performers' side) exist to license uses and distribute collections — register with the society covering your rights, because unregistered works are invisible to blanket-licensing money. Direct deals (labels, platforms, brands) remain common for uses the societies don't yet cover — which makes your own licensing paperwork part of the collection system.

• Broadcast, streaming, YouTube, live, sync — five sources, two rights layers
• Register with the collection societies — blanket money finds members
• Sync is Nepal's under-collected growth royalty

The protection steps that get you paid

Document authorship — dated demos, stems, session files, credits: the creation record every later dispute or registration leans on. Register the works at the NCRO — the certificate that makes ownership undeniable when a platform, brand or broadcaster asks. Paper the splits — co-writing and band agreements stating percentages (50/50, 60/40, whatever was agreed *at the time*), because undocumented splits default to joint ownership where any co-author can license non-exclusively. Control the master — producer and label agreements that state who owns the fixation and on what terms (the work-for-hire trap applies: without written terms, the studio owns more than you assumed — or you own less). Join the societies — membership is how blanket-licensed uses find you.

The discipline costs an afternoon per release and is the difference between having rights and monetising them. Nepal's music economy pays the artists whose paperwork exists; the rest earn from concerts alone.

When someone uses your track without paying

The enforcement sequence for unlicensed use: document the use (recordings, broadcasts, screenshots, the ad itself); identify the user (the brand, producer, platform channel — not just the uploader); notice — a cease-and-desist citing the rights (work, author, registration certificate) and the remedy sought (retroactive licence fee, cessation, credit); and escalate where notice fails — the NCRO's enforcement channels and the courts, with the statutory remedies copyright infringement carries. For platform uses (YouTube, social), the platform's own takedown/rights channels move fastest — and work best when your ownership documentation is already in order.

The strategic note for Nepalese artists: enforcement income is real but licensing income is bigger — the ad agency that used your track without asking usually wanted it and will pay for it if approached professionally. The rights map, the registration and the splits are what let you negotiate instead of just complain.