They stated that “viewed from this perspective”, the criminal complaint for infringement was “an abuse of the process of law”. This case raises more questions than it answers. The Court based their decision to quash the complaint on the fact that there was prima facie evidence to show that the Defendant composed only five out of ten lines, or the frills, and not the crux of the song. What is also in desperate need of clarification, is their stance on the alleged copyright infringement that this order should have centred around. Why then, would the court dismiss the criminal complaint on this ground? The orders passed in the civil suit should not have affected their adjudication on a petition for copyright infringement. Daya Sapra has recognised that there is no bar to civil and criminal proceedings running parallel. The Supreme Court, in its 20 decisions of P. There is no bar on maintaining both civil and criminal proceedings simultaneously The Court then allowed the petition and quashed the criminal complaint, stating that since several orders had been passed in the civil suit, and as it was still pending, the Defendant’s rights “had not been crystallised”.
#Excuse me mr kandasamy lyrics movie#
They then note that there was no formal agreement entered into between the two parties on the lyrics, and question why the Defendant waited till the movie was released to file the complaints, when he accepted that his lyrics were being used in the trailer as well.
The Court first chides the Defendant as he was “presumed to know the law”, being an advocate. The order passed is quite abrupt, encompasses a mere eight pages, does not expound on case law relied on, and barely explains the stance the Court wishes to take on infringement.
On the other hand, the Plaintiffs base their defence on the fact that the Defendant had composed only the ‘pallavi’ portion, or the frills of the song and not the ‘saranam’ portion, which they explain to be the crux of the song. In the criminal complaint, the Defendant primarily alleges the infringement of his rights held in the lyrics, He argues that he alone is entitled to exploit all rights in the lyrics, and prays for an interim injunction restraining the Plaintiffs from infringing his rights by using his composed lyrics in their film. 15910/2016) to call for the records of, as well as quash the criminal complaint. The Plaintiffs then filed the present suit (Crl.O.P. The civil suit notwithstanding, he filed a criminal complaint (C.C 3239/2009) for the offences of copyright infringement and criminal conspiracy. Elango’ to be displayed as the lyricist of the ‘ pallavi’ portion. Further orders were passed in June 2009 which mandated the name of the Defendant – ‘Mr. The matter was then appealed at the end of the month to a division bench, where the order was modified to the effect that the injunction was suspended, but the Plaintiffs were directed to display the name of the Respondent along with the ‘Mr. On the 18th of April, 2009, a single judge of the Madras High Court passed an order that there was prima facie evidence to show that the Defendant had composed the ‘pallavi’ portion and had granted an interim injunction of the use of only that portion. In 2009, he had filed civil suit (C.S 36/2009) seeking a declaration that only he could exploit all rights in respect of the lyrics. I found this on YouTube, I hope it’s the official version that was released. He claims that the Plaintiffs included the lyrics in the song that features in the film, and credited someone called ‘Mr. It was this portion that he read out over the phone to the Plaintiffs, as well as sent to them on a CD. In accordance with this agreement, he wrote part of the lyrics, referred to as the ‘ pallavi’ portion. The Defendant, both an advocate practicing in the Madras High Court as well as a Tamil Lyricist, was hired by the Plaintiffs to compose the lyrics of a song titled ‘Hey, Excuse me, Mr. On the 30th of September, 2016 – the Madras High Court passed a significant order on the copyright infringement of song lyrics in Susi Ganesan & Others v.