Case: Krishika Lulla  Vs. Shyam Vithalrao Devkatta

2. The respondent No. 1-Shyam Vithalrao Devkatta, filed a complaint being Criminal Case No. SW/332 of 2011 under Section 63 of the Copyright Act, later amended to add additional charges under Sections 406 and 420 read with Section 34 of the IPC, against five persons. Upon due verification process was issued by the learned Metropolitan Magistrate against all except the fifth accused. Of these accused, four approached the Bombay High Court by way of filing two criminal misc. applications, under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (hereinafter referred to asfor quashing the complaint. The High Court having refused to quash the complaint, the appellants have approached this Court.3. The complainant/Respondent No.1 claims copyright in a synopsis of a story written by him with the title. According to him, he had written a story with the titlend had got the synopsis of the story registered with the Film Writers Association on 25.11.2008, when a friend, one Ramesh Bhatnagar, told him that a comedy film story is required by the son of a film Director, David Dhawan, he mailed the concept of the story in the form of a synopsis as an attachment to an email addressed to Ramesh Bhatnagar on 14.10.2009 with the wordsFriend, just see theRamesh Bhatnagar forwarded the story, calling itby email to one Ahsan Sagar on 15.10.2009. What was forwarded was apparently the same short synopsis of the concept with the title. A copy on the record makes it clear that it was by no means the entire story with all the dialogues and the screen play. Having done so, his friend Ramesh Bhatnagar did not receive any reply but, suddenly the complainant saw the promos of a film bearing the title, actually spelt as. According to him, the adoption of the titleis a clear infringement of the copyright in the film title. Admittedly, he has not seen the film and he states in his complaint, he cannot say whether a part of the story of the film written by him has also been infringed.4. In the meanwhile, the appellants released their film with the titleut the world including India on 25.11.2011. According to them, the film is based on a story written by one Milap Zaveri, who wrote the story under an agreement dated 02.09.2009, for which they have paid the author by cheque. The shooting of the film commenced on 07.11.2010 and the respondent No. 1 came to know about the film sometime on 12.10.2011. The details of the defence are not dealt with here since the matter must be decided on the basis of the tenability of the complaint.5. The Court of Learned Metropolitan Magistrate having taken cognizance, as stated above the appellants approached the Bombay High Court under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C for quashing the complaint and process issued under Section 63 of the Copyright Act read with Sections 406 and 420 of IPC. The learned Single Judge who heard the matter as a part of a batch of matters in which parties had challenged the order issuing process against them in several different cases, dismissed the applications. In paragraph 97 of the judgment, the High Court considered the appellants case and merely pointed out that according to the appellants, the story which they had converted into a film was written by an author to whom they had paid a certain amount under an agreement even before the complaint of the respondent No. 1- Devkatta. Thereupon, the High Court merely observed that the facts alleged by the respondent No. 1 can only be determined at the trial and on the face of the record there was neither any abuse of court nor failure of justice and the applications were simply dismissed. There is no decision on the various issues raised by the appellants, hence these

Court's reasoning:
19. We are thus, of the view, that no copyright subsists in the title of a literary work and a plaintiff or a complainant is not entitled to relief on such basis except in an action for passing off or in respect of a registered trademark comprising such titles. This does not mean that in no case can a title be a proper subject of protection against being copied as held in Dicks v Yates where Jessel M.R saidmight be copyright in a title as for instance a whole page of title or something of that kind requiringor as observed by Copinger (supra).20. In the present case we find that there is no copyright in the titlend thus no question of its infringement arises. The prosecution based on allegations of infringement of copyright in such a title is untenable.21. The learned counsel for the respondents indeed contended that the applications under Section 482 were rightly dismissed since these facts alleged by the appellants depend on evidence at the trial. It is not possible to agree since it has throughout been the case of the respondent No.1-Devkatta that he is claiming copyright only in the title of the synopsis of his storynd he has not even seen the film of the appellants nor does he know the story. The learned counsel for the respondent was however right in his submissions that it is not necessary to furnish all the ingredients of the complaint and failing which the complaint is liable to be dismissed on that ground. It is not necessary to consider the decisions cited by the respondents on this point.