Shah Rukh in legal soup over copyright

A petition has been filed against Shah Rukh Khan’s Red Chillies Private Ltd, TV channel NDTV Imagine and Sunanda Oberai by Neha Joshi for making a serial Ghar Ki Baat, based on the script written by her father, Sharad, for a comedy serial called Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi, without obtaining any prior permission and violating the Copyright Act.

In the petition, Neha has said that the script was written by Sharad for the Oberais in 1984 and alleged that they have sold it to the Khan’s production house without the Joshi family’s permission.

Neha’s lawyer said they came to know about the script through one of the Khan’s interview. In the petition, Joshi has asked for compensation for violating the Copyright Act. Oberai’s lawyer told the media that Sharad had written the script for the Oberais and thus they are ultimate owners of the script and hence there was no copyright violation.

The court has asked Red Chillies to file its reply by February 14 and the next hearing is on February 16.