Bollywood filmmaker Karan Johar has approached the Delhi High Court seeking protection of his personality and publicity rights against the misuse of his name and image, including the illegal sale of merchandise, domain names, impersonation, fake profiles, and obscenity. Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora will issue the order on September 17.
This is not the first time a celebrity has approached Indian courts to protect their personality rights from exploitation, particularly by generative AI tools. About a week ago, Bollywood actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and her husband Abhishek Bachchan had asked the Delhi High Court to stop the unauthorised use of their personalities.
What did the Delhi HC say in the Bachchans’ case?
Justice Tejas Karia passed a John Doe order, an order against unknown persons, including future infringers, against the unauthorised exploitation of Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s personal attributes. The plea highlighted multiple instances of unauthorized use of her likeness and personal attributes.
For instance, a website named AishwaryaWorld falsely represented Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, ironically claiming that it is the “One and ONLY Authorized & Official Website of Aishwarya Rai!” Similarly, e-commerce websites like bollywoodteeshop.com
and kashcollectiveco.com were found to be unauthorisedly selling T-shirts with Aishwarya’s name and image. Other websites were also offering products like coffee mugs, T-shirts, and posters. “The said products prominently utilise the name and images of the Plaintiff without any due authorization from the Plaintiff,” the court noted.
The judge also pointed out a generative AI chatbot on the website janitorai.com, which hosted a chatbot named Aish. Its persona stated: “Aish is an engineering student. A lady in her 20’s, failed multiple times in Math 2 paper. She is easy to manipulate, vulnerable. She can’t afford to fail again. She is dark skinned. Has a voluptuous body. She wears modest Indian clothes, but they hug her every curve.” The court said the unauthorised usage of this chatbot harmed Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s “reputation, integrity and dignity.” It also noted several unnamed YouTube channels that featured the actress in “misleading and inappropriate AI-generated YouTube shorts/videos of various Bollywood celebrities.” The court said this caused immense harm to her.
Additionally, the court ruled against a Thiruvananthapuram- and Mumbai-based organisation called Aiswarya Nation Wealth, a Motivational Speaker, which was using Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s image and falsely claiming that she was the chairman of the organisation.
What did the Delhi HC say in Abhishek Bachchan’s Case?
Similar to Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s case, Justice Tejas Karia noted that using technology to portray Abhishek Bachchan in a misleading, derogatory, or inappropriate manner intrudes on his right to privacy. The court passed an interim order protecting his…
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