Extending their support to the ongoing strike by Writers Guild of America (WGA), India’s Screenwriters Association (SWA) has requested its members to halt their work on US-based films and web series. Members of the WGA went on strike early this week demanding better wages, higher minimum pay, more writers per show, and shorter exclusive contracts among other things.
The WGA is making valid requests on behalf of the writers’ fraternity, according to SWA General Secretary Zaman Habib, and they have their support. “We have appealed to our SWA members, whosoever is working on international shows and films, they should not be writing for now. It is a blanket request… appeal to them. We have great rapport and association with Writers Guild of America (WGA), Writers Guild of Israel, Great Britain, we are also affiliated with International Affiliation of Writers Guild (IAWG), we are one of the members, so we keep supporting each other,” Habib mentioned by speaking to PTI.
He mentioned Guilds of other movies are also backing WGA. “Every Guild has appealed to their members not to take up any show so that they can support the WGA and writers’ fraternity. This is a valid demand. WGA is trying to negotiate but it didn’t work out with producers so they had to go about with this strike and we are in solidarity with them,” Habib averred.
This week, the WGA’s 11,500 Hollywood screenwriters for motion pictures and television began striking. Hollywood’s entertainment sector has encountered situations like this previously; the most recent WGA strike, which lasted 100 days in 2007–2008, was preceded by a 153-day strike that significantly slowed production in 1988.
According to Habib, SWA, which has roughly 55,000 members from all over the nation, is also talking with Indian producers regarding the issues that regional authors are facing. “When we support WGA in this negotiation, we also want to negotiate with our producers and we will need their support. We are also ready with our minimum basic contract and we are negotiating with producers individually now,” he mentioned.
One of the key issues the SWA has been attempting to resolve in relation to the hurdles experienced by Indian writers is getting paid for royalties, according to Habib. “No one is talking about royalty whereas all over the world writers are being paid royalties. The bill has been passed in 2012 and now it is 2023 but no one is going ahead with that. We are also suffering and we are taking baby steps. We want to have clear communication with producers,” he added.
