Supreme Court quashes criminal case against film director Sujoy Ghosh over copyright on Kahaani 2's script

The Supreme Court on Friday quashed criminal proceedings against filmmaker Sujoy Ghosh in a copyright infringement case over his film Kahaani 2: Durga Rani Singh [Sujoy Ghosh vs. The State of Jharkhand & Anr.].

A Bench of Justices PS Narasimha and Alok Aradhe noted that the complaint against Ghosh contained only bald allegations without identifying any specific similarity between the complainant’s script and the film.

“Thus, it is evident that the complaint only contains bald and unsubstantiated allegations and do not even prima facie disclose the similarity between the film and the script,” it observed.

The case arose from a complaint filed by one Umesh Prasad Mehta, who alleged that Ghosh had copied his script titled Sabak for the 2016 film. He claimed to have shared the script with Ghosh in 2015.

Based on the complaint, a Chief Judicial Magistrate in Hazaribagh had issued summons against Ghosh in 2018 for an offence under Section 63 of the Copyright Act. The Jharkhand High Court later refused to quash the proceedings, observing that the allegations required trial.

Ghosh then approached the Supreme Court.

Before the top court, Senior Advocate Siddhartha Dave, appearing for Ghosh, argued that the complaint lacked any material to show similarity between the works and that the criminal proceedings were an abuse of process.

Accepting these submissions, the Supreme Court held that both the summoning order and the High Court’s refusal to interfere suffered from non-application of mind.

It further observed that even the statements of the complainant’s witnesses failed to prove that any portion of the script that was copied.

Importantly, the Bench took note of the findings of the Screen Writers Association’s Dispute Settlement Committee, which had already concluded that there was no similarity between the two works. The Court found that this crucial fact had been concealed from the Magistrate.

The Court also underscored that Ghosh's script for Kahaani 2 had been registered years before the complainant’s script came into existence, making the allegation of copyright infringement untenable.

“Thus, the appellant’s work clearly preceded the complainant’s script in point of time and the question of copyright infringement does not arise.” it noted.

The Court reiterated that when allegations appear frivolous or malicious, courts must look beyond the complaint and examine the surrounding circumstances to prevent abuse of the criminal process.

Accordingly, the Court set aside the summoning order as well as the High Court’s judgment and quashed the entire criminal proceedings pending before the trial court.

Ghosh was represented by Dave along with advocates Anu Shrivastava, Harsh Kaushik, Shwetank Tripathi, Devangini Rai and Himanshu Tyagi.

The respondents were represented by Senior Advocate Gagan Gupta along with advocates Kumar Anurag Singh, Anando Mukherjee, Dev Aaryan, Preety Ranjan, Meenakshi Kalra, SN Kalra, Kamal, Sakshi Gupta, Vrinda Taneja, Mayank and Anjali Choudhary.

[Read Judgment]