JUST SPAMMING | A Persistent Fight To Protect Personality Rights

Film music maestro Ilayaraja’s latest legal triumph on protecting his personality rights has once again given fodder to the obnoxious troll industry that has started going to town, accusing the celebrated musician of several things like arrogance, greed and so on. In reality it has become a common thing though there are no specific laws providing watertight protection to celebrities over their personality. Of late a spate of such cases have come to the Supreme Court with well-known personalities like Rajinikanth, Jackie Shroff, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Akshay Kumar and Sri Sri Ravishankar seeking the help of courts to stop the misuse of their images, names and voices and have been given relief, affirming their personality rights and restraining the misuse of their identity for commercial gains.

But whenever Ilayaraja is embroiled in such an issue that mainly involves copyrights, he is targeted perhaps because his first known spat was with singer S P Balasubramanyan. Way back in 2017 when the singer was on a world tour, giving live concerts, Illayaraja demanded royalties for performing his compositions. That was a time when Tamil cinema lovers, who are ardent fans of both the singer and the music director, found the demand for loyalty a bit absurd. They had not heard about such a squabble earlier in their backyard. The popular perception till then was that when a music director comes up with a tune, an orchestra performs it with singers lending their voice to the lyrics that are written by another lyricist. So the rights of the collective effort cannot be appropriated by any one of them since all of them get paid for their contribution by the film producer, everyone felt.

Though Balasubrmanyan, hopefully, bought peace with his friend Ilayaraja before bidding adieu to all of us in 2020, the music director continued to court controversies giving room for his adversaries to hit out at him when he raised the copyright issue with the makers of the Malayalam blockbuster Manjummel Boys in 2024 and Rajinikanth starrer Coolie recently. Ilayaraja had sent a legal notice for using the song, ‘Vaa, vaa Pakkam vaa,’ in the promotional teaser of Coolie without taking permission from him. In the case relating to the film Manjummel Boys, since the song ‘Kanmani Anbodu Kadhalan,’ from the 1991 film Gunaa, formed the crux of the film’s narration, many people, who did not support Ilayaraja when he asked royalty from S P Balasubramanyan for performing his compositions, found some legitimacy in the demand. Finally, the matter was settled out of court reportedly for an amount of Rs 60 lakh.

Perhaps in the backdrop of the varied tussles with filmmakers, Ilayaraja’s latest battle to protect his personality rights has evoked skepticism. He managed to get an interim injunction restraining the unauthorized use of his name, photograph and other attributes for commercial gain by television and YouTube channels, music companies and others active in social media. The musician’s lawyers have said that the name ‘Ilaiyarajaa,’ however it is spelt, and the title ‘Isaignani’ (meaning musical genius) have virtually become unregistered trademarks. So no third party could use the name or the title for commercial gain without his permission, the court has been told,

Ilayaraja has said that he has composed music for around 8,500 songs and was regarded as a legend and creative genius across the globe. He is the only composer in the world to have scored music for over 1,450 feature films in nine languages, the claim goes. Besides, he has written lyrics for 1,500 songs and sung around 1000 songs. His background score for films alone exceeds 1.5 lakh minutes. With such a body of work to his credit, he had built, over the years, a brand of himself, generating extensive and unparalleled goodwill and recognition, his lawyer told the court adding that he had the right to command and control over his name, image and likeness and empowered to authorize the commercial use of his name, image and likeness in view of his contribution to music and his emergence as the most sought after celebrity.

Now that many YouTube channels and Instagram accounts were commercially exploiting his personality rights by publishing his songs without permission, he saw in the unauthorized use of his ‘persona’ not just a violation of his personal rights but an affront to his contribution to Indian culture, he said and wanted protection for various aspects of his personality like name, voice, quintessential style of musical performance, songs, musical work, image and photographs and titles. Justice N Senthilkumar of the Madras High Court granted the injunction. But his critics raised a slew of questions over his demand for protecting his persona.

While there could be no second opinion on the greatness of his musical talents and his extraordinary achievements, the present persona, which he wants the court to protect, was gained from the acceptance, recognition and adulation he received primarily from the movie-going population of Tamil Nadu, his critics point out. Does he want the ‘persona’ to be protected from those who basically bestowed it on him? There is nothing wrong in him wanting to prevent the exploitation of his talent by commercially driven entities like the music companies. It is also commendable that he stands for protecting intellectual property rights in the film industry. But the industry itself survives and thrives on idolatry, which alone lends the persona to celebrities.