Protection against deepfakes
It is in the fitness of things that while taking a progressive and nuanced stand, the Bombay High Court in a recent judgment titled Akshay Hari Om Bhatia vs John Doe and Ors in the exercise of its ordinary original civil jurisdiction, granted ad-interim relief and urgent interim protection to Bollywood actor Akshay Hari Om Bhatia known famously as Akshay Kumar over his personality rights and restrained websites, social media accounts, e-commerce sites, AI content creators and others (all unknown persons) from misusing his name, image, likeness, voice and personality rights without his consent or authorization.
The bench of Justice Arif S Doctor minced no words in holding that “realistic nature of deepfake images and videos” created with AI was “deeply concerning”, adding that such fabrications not only violated Kumar’s personality and moral rights but also posed a “grave threat” to public order and the safety of his family.
Akshay Kumar had filed the commercial IP suit seeking to restrain unauthorized exploitation of his personality across digital platforms. The suit invoked Article 21 of the Constitution and the Copyright Act of 1957 to assert his right to privacy, dignity and moral rights. The actor, who has used the screen name “Akshay Kumar” throughout his 35-year film career had argued that deepfakes and AI impersonations caused serious harm to his reputation and public standing.
Senior counsel Birendra Saraf who represented Akshay Kumar cited several instances which included a fake movie trailer that falsely depicted Akshay as UP CM Yogi Adityanath and garnered nearly two million views before being taken down and leading to huge public outrage.
Another AI-generated trailer for a non-existent film titled “Maharishi Valmiki” portraying Akshay Kumar as Valmiki that had gone viral online and triggered furore and protests in Jalandhar after members of the Valmiki community found the portrayal of their revered saint as “deeply offensive”. It was contended that Kumar was wrongfully implicated in communal disharmony.
The actor submitted that such misuse not only infringes upon his right of publicity but also damages his professional reputation, undermines the goodwill built over his career, and harms his genuine upcoming film projects. The Bench conceded that the realistic nature of AI-generated deepfakes made them nearly indistinguishable from genuine footage and was therefore, particularly dangerous. It was in this background that the Court, pending final disposal of the application also directed social media platforms to take down and remove access to the infringed material.