An FIR has recently been filed against the CEO of Google, Sundar Pichai, and five other employees of the tech giant at the MIDC police station following a court order. The FIR has been registered based on a complaint put forward by a Bollywood filmmaker, director, and producer, Suneel Darshan, alleging Copyright Infringement. In his complaint filed against Pichai and other Google employees, Darshan said that he didn’t sell the rights of his 2017 film ‘Ek Haseena Thi Ek Deewana Tha’ to anyone; however, the film is still running on YouTube (owned by Google) without his permission and with millions of views. He further claimed that many people made a lot of money by uploading his film (which falls under his Intellectual Property (IP)) on YouTube. He even mentioned that he made multiple complaints to YouTube for many years concerning the illegal uploading of his film, but didn’t receive any response, following which he had to approach the court.
According to the police officer involved, the case has been filed at the MIDC Police Station in suburban Andheri on the orders given by a magistrate’s court.
When reached out to Google for comments on the said matter, the search engine giant said that it has a well-defined set mechanism using which the copyright holders can safeguard their unique and creative content on video-sharing platforms like YouTube. The Google spokesperson said that YouTube has the right management tools, such as its Content ID System, that enables the copyright holders to identify, promote, block, and even make money in an automated way from the uploads of their content on the platform. He also mentioned that when a copyright holder notifies YouTube about a video that infringes upon his content, the platform removes the content quickly as per the law and terminates the accounts of the users with several copyright strikes (a policing practice used by YouTube to manage copyright infringement and comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act).
The alleged infringers covered in the complaint filed include YouTube LLC, Google India Ltd., Google LLC, Sundar Pichai, and many others. The offense has been filed under sections 51, 63, and 69 relating to Copyright Violation of the Indian Copyright Act, 1957.
The film ‘Ek Haseena Thi Ek Deewana Tha’ was written, produced, and directed by Suneel Darshan and starred Natasha Fernandez, Shiv Darshan, and Upen Patel.
Meanwhile, the Indian Government has selected Sundar Pichai (the CEO of Google), Satya Nadella (the CEO of Microsoft), and Natarajan Chandrasekaran (the Chairperson of Tata Group) for Padma Bhushan, which is the third-highest civilian award in the nation. For more visit: https://www.trademarkmaldives.com
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