HC refuses to grant stay on release of Amitabh starrer 'Nishabd'

New Delhi, Feb 23 (UNI) Delhi High Court today reserved its order on a petition seeking a stay on the release of the Amitabh Bachchan starrer 'Nishabd' claiming that the film's title was plagiarised from a Bengali movie of a similar name.

Justice A K Sikri said the order would be pronounced next week before Friday, the scheduled release date of Ram Gopal Varma's movie.

However, the court refused to grant a stay on the release of the film.

Senior Counsel Rajiv Nayar, appearing for Varma, argued that the petition of Jahar Kanungo should be dismissed as there was no violation of the Copyright Act or Trademark Act as both the films had different storylines.

''Nisshabd'' produced by Kanungo was in Bengali and it was an art film in documentary form, submitted Nayar.

Moreover, Kanungo, despite being aware about the title of Varma's film since before, approached the court just before the scheduled release of the movie, he contended.

Citing evidence, he said on May 8, 2006 Kanungo had written an e-mail to Western Indian Film Producers Association about the title of the film and he should have earlier approached Varma or the court seeking restriant.

However, Counsel Kartik Jai Shanker, appearing for Kanungo, said Varma had knowingly infringed on the intellectual property rights over the name and title of Kanungo's film 'Nisshabd'' which had won many international awards.

Kanungo said that his ''Nisshabd'' was produced with the financial aid, released under the French government's "Fonds Sud Cinema" scheme in November 2002.

The Central Board of Film Certification too had subsequently cleared the name for the film in June 2005, said the petition.

UNI