The Ernakulam Additional District and Sessions Court has temporarily stayed the screening of Tamil movie ‘Naiyaandi’ following a permanent injunction petition filed by the producer of Malayalam film ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’, Mani C Kappan, alleging copyright violation.
Kappan alleged that the story and scenes of ‘Naiyaandi’ were copied from his movie ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’, directed by Rajasenan and released in 1993.
Following the petition, the court granted temporary injunction against the screening of the movie ‘Naiyaandi’ and issued summons to the producing company, Five Star Films Pvt Ltd, represented by Subramanium Kathriravalan, to be present before it on November 11.
In the petition, Kappan said the Tamil film, directed by A Sarkunam, was produced and released without his consent and knowledge.
“Sarkunam not only copied the story of ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’ but also lifted its dialogues and several scenes. It is clear violation of copyright. Any common man who sees the film would realise that the movie is ditto of ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’,” he said in his petition.
He said even Surkunam had disclosed in interviews that he was inspired by ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’.
“It is enough to show that ‘Naiyaandi’ violates the Copyright Act. The satellite right of the movie has been sold to Sun TV network and video rights have been given to some other agencies. Since the movie was adopted from the Malayalam movie, screening and video rights of the ‘Naiyaandi’ should be restrained. Even though the petitioner is entitled to get damages for infringement of copyrights, the compensation is not sought and he is reserving his claim for damages,” the petition by Kappan stated.
Kappan said he was planning to bring out Hindi version of ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’ soon. The initial work for bringing out the Hindi version of the film, to be directed by Siddique, has started and talks are on with M/S Reliance for the distribution. The scenes and screenplay are ready,” he said. Kappen has said although the first half of ‘Naiyaandi’ has no resemblance to ‘Meleparambil Aanveedu’, in the second half, over 12 scenes had been copied from his film.