Chennai: The Madras High Court has dismissed an appeal filed by actor Kajal Agarwal seeking a compensation of Rs 2.5 crore from oil major M/s VVD and Sons Private Limited for continuously using advertisement acted by her in 2008.
The company made advertisement acted by her in 2008. She claimed that the company agreed to telecast the advertisement for a year as per contract. As the company used the advertisement even after a year, she approached the court seeking compensation of Rs 2.5 crore from the firm. On July 3, 2017, a single judge dismissed her petition. Aggrieved over this she filed an appeal before the court.
When the matter came up for hearing, Division Bench Comprising Justices MM Sundresh and N. Anand Venkatesh upheld the order of single judge order dated July 3, 2017, and stated that VVD is the first owner of the Copyright. A person, who thus becomes the first owner of the Copyright for his entire work, has been conferred with a statutory right for a period of 60 years over the Cinematograph of the Film. This statutory right cannot be taken away by a performer in the cinematograph film by virtue of an agreement. Hence we hold that VVD is entitled to exploit the work for the entire term prescribed under section 26 of the Copyright Act and is not restricted for a period of one year by the agreement.
Dismissing her appeal the bench said "it is an admitted fact that Kajal Agarwal by virtue of clause 4 of the agreement has acknowledged the specific condition that the cinematograph film and other promotional materials in any medium developed between both Kajal Agarwal and VVD will be the copy right of the VVD. By virtue of this condition VVD who is the author of the work shall be the first owner of the Copyright. As the first owner of the Copyright, the VVD will have the exclusive right to communicate the cinematograph film to the public by virtue of section 14 (i)(d)(iii) of Copyright Act. Once VVD becomes the First owner of the copy right the right shall subsist for a period of 60 years as provided under Section 26 of the Copyright act."
