Aastha Thakur
Published on: 29 July, 2022 at 20:22 IST
Bombay High Court recently granted ad interim injunction to aggrieved party Applause Productions. The copyright infringement suit was instituted against a person pretending as casting director for the web series ‘Criminal Justice’.
The suit was heard by Justice RI Chagla who directed the respondent, one Krishna Anand restrained them from directly or indirectly using or publishing on social media, the posts as well as photographs of actors, characters and their still images from the web series. The suit was initiated after the producer production house came across the instagram post calling for casting in relation to the web series.
The legal notice was issued to him calling out to delete the alleged post as well as cease and desist from using the plaintiff’s material. After he failed to comply, a copyright suit was instituted against him. The Petitioner hereby only asked to restrain Anand from committing acts of copyright infringement, violation of plaintiff’s publicity rights, misrepresentation and passing off.
The plea contended that the respondent was using plaintiff’s artistic work, promotional material, creatives, and still photographs pertaining to the plaintiff’s web series ‘Criminal Justice’ without permission.
Further the posting of still image from the web series and photographs of main cast are condemned to be unlawful promotional activity and conducting the business of casting for the series, the respondent was violating the plaintiff’s copyright.
The plaint mentioned that the defendant not only invited auditions from male artists but also from female and child artists. It was hereby claim by the petitioner that the person in question has no credibility and could be indulge in other illegal activities by misusing the photographs and videos received by him.
It was further stated that the defendant committed the wrongful acts deliberately trying to create confusion and deception with malafide intention to lure innocent people and to take undue advantage of naivety and innocence of struggling film actors trying to make an impact in a competitive film industry.