 "Jackie Shroff")
Ram followed in the footsteps of Lakhan on Tuesday when Bollywood actor Jackie Shroff approached the Delhi High Court to restrain firms, social media channels, artificial intelligence (AI) apps, and GIF-making platforms from using his name, voice, image, or any other attribute without his consent.
Last year, the Delhi High Court had restrained the misuse of Anil Kapoor’s name, image, voice, and other attributes of his persona for commercial gain.
Jackie Shroff and Anil Kapoor played brothers in the Bollywood film "Ram Lakhan".
Shroff has also in his plea demanded that the unauthorised use of his nicknames 'Jackie', 'Jaggu Dada', and 'Bhidu' be restricted. It is protected under the personality/publicity rights and trademark law, the plea said.
“In addition to his voice, the plaintiff has unique ways of delivering his dialogues, for which the plaintiff has become popular. Certain Hindi films have become popular only because of certain signature dialogues of the plaintiff… In fact, on many occasions, the style is brought about by the plaintiff himself through improvisation on set,” the plea said.
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Justice Sanjeev Narula heard the matter and issued summons to the defendants. The next hearing is on 15 May.
Advocate Pravin Anand, appearing for Shroff, told the court that in some instances, offensive memes have been made using his images and that his voice has been misused for similar purposes as well.
He emphasised that Shroff was not looking to stop parody or satire, but wanted an injunction against merchandising and defamatory and distorted uses of his personality.
The plea also seeks a direction to the Department of Technology and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) to pull down all the links and websites which unlawfully infringe on his personality rights.
Shroff has moved the court to protect aspects of his personality that are unique and restrict the “unauthorised use of which by third parties is likely to create confusion and deception amongst the public”.
He said that several social media companies, stores, social media handles, as well as AI tools are using his attributes without authorisation to make money and damage his reputation in the process.
Google-owned Tenor and GIF-making company Giphy, as well as AI platforms, have been made parties to his suit.
“Further, on account of their inimitable nature, the plaintiff's name, voice, image, likeness, signature, mannerisms, gestures, and other such elements of the plaintiff's persona also have a huge commercial value associated with them. Any third party found using any of the above-stated elements of the plaintiff's persona is bound to cause confusion and deception amongst the general public as to affiliation with or sponsorship by the plaintiff,” Shroff said in his plea.
The plea stated in many cases, the plaintiff's identity is used in an unwholesome and unsavoury manner which maligns his reputation and exposes him to ridicule, thereby tarnishing his image.
In 2022, the High Court had restrained people at large from infringing the personality and publicity rights of Bollywood actor Amitabh Bachchan.
