Actor Kangana Ranaut and her brother Akshat Deep Ranaut moved the Bombay High Court challenging an order directing an FIR against them by Mumbai Police for alleged copyright violation and cheating in connection with a film.
A Division Bench of Justices S.S. Shinde and G.A. Sanap was hearing a petition filed by the duo to quash the order passed by the magistrate directing the Mumbai Police to register an FIR.
Advocate Rizwan Siddiquee, appearing for them, said, “The FIR was filed by virtue of an announcement made. There was no work which infringed copyright. The whole FIR is lodged on a false case. Copyright infringement can be there only when there is comparative work. The petitioners have not made any work till now. She [Kangana] had only announced on her social media that she was planning to make a movie on Queen Didda.”
The matter was adjourned and public prosecutor Deepak Thakare gave an assurance that no coercive action will be taken against them till June 28.
In January this year, Ms. Ranaut had announced her next production, ‘Manikarna Returns: The Legend of Didda’, which is based on the story of the Queen of Kashmir who had defeated Mahmud of Ghazni, the first independent ruler of Turkic. A First Information Report was registered on March 15, 2021, against the producer of the film Kamal Jain, Ms. Ranaut and her siblings, after Ashish Kaul, the author of the book ‘Didda: The Warrior Queen of Kashmir’, accused them of copyright violation and cheating.
The FIR was registered by the Khar police after an order from the magistrate court directed them to do so. As per the complaint, Mr. Kaul has exclusive copyright and the actor has violated it by announcing the film. She and others have been charged under several sections of the Indian Penal Code and The Copyright Act.
In the petition filed by Ms. Ranaut and her brother, they have challenged the magistrate’s order to lodge the FIR, and a notice issued under Section 41 A (notice of appearance before police officer) of the Code of Criminal Procedure by the police directing them to appear for questioning.