Delhi High Court: While hearing a plaint filed by the acclaimed singer Jubin Nautiyal seeking protection of his personality rights, the Single Judge Bench of Tushar Rao Gedela, J., held that the voice, name, likeness etc. of Jubin Nautiyal were exclusively attributable to him. Thus, the Court granted an ex parte ad interim injunction in favour of Jubin Nautiyal, restraining the defendants from creating or disseminating any AI-generated pictures, videos or merchandise that misuses and infringes upon the personality rights of Jubin Nautiyal.
Background
Jubin Nautiyal is a renowned singer who has studied music as a subject and has learnt various instruments like guitar, piano, harmonium and drums. Over the years Jubin Nautiyal has given several live performances and has participated in television music reality show X-Factor and MTV Unplugged Season 5. Jubin Nautiyal has also sung several songs in many hit movies and blockbusters in Bollywood. He has also been felicitated with several awards like IIFA, IIA, ITA, Mirchi and Wow Awards Asia which is a recognition of Jubin Nautiyal’s eminence, goodwill and reputation showcasing his immense commercial value all over the globe.
Jubin Nautiyal enjoys extensive and widespread social media presence on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube and has established exceptional goodwill and reputation in the music industry through his remarkable contribution and achievements over the last many years. He has gained immense respect and admiration within the industry and among the global audience.
Jubin Nautiyal averred that the defendants are infringing his publicity/personality rights:
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By use of artificial intelligence to morph Jubin Nautiyal’s face onto videos, distort his facial expressions, overlaying profane audio clips to certain video clips of him, creating AI platforms which permit the creation of unlicensed chatbots, etc
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Through sale of products/merchandise with Jubin Nautiyal’s images, signature and other elements affixed to the product.
Analysis, Law and Decision
The Court noted that Jubin Nautiyal had a prima facie strong case and having regard to his well-known, popular and well-accepted personality, the balance of convenience is tilted in favour of Jubin Nautiyal. The Court further opined that in case, ex parte ad interim injunction and other directions, as sought, are not passed, irreparable loss and injury may be caused to Jubin Nautiyal which may not be compensated in monetary terms.
Accordingly, the Court granted an ex parte ad interim injunction in favor of Jubin Nautiyal and directed that:
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The defendants and all persons acting on their behalf were restrained from creating, publishing or making available to the public the impugned AI-generated movie misusing Jubin Nautiyal’s persona, as well as any other content exploiting or misappropriating his personality traits.
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Defendants, including john does were restrained from violating Jubin Nautiyal’s personality/publicity rights by utilising in any manner and/or directly and/or indirectly, using or exploiting or misappropriating any facets of his personality traits, including:
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his photographs, image, likeness;
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visuals, voice and speech patterns;
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any other attributes of his persona which are exclusively identifiable with him; and
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any deepfake, morphed, superimposed, or manipulated content, for any commercial or personal gain without his authorisation or consent.
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Defendants 5, 6, 14 and 15 were directed to take down/block access/suspend all infringing content that has been uploaded by the defendants and/or any other third-party, which infringe Jubin Nautiyal’s personality/publicity rights.
The matter was further listed for 25-8-2026.
[Jubin Nautiyal v. Jammable Ltd., CS (COMM) No. 166 of 2026, decided on 19-2-2026]
Advocates who appeared in this case:
For the Plaintiff: Vivek Vidyarthi, Suvigya Vidyarthi, Sarvagya Vidyarthi, Nischay Chaudhary, Apoorva Singh, Rushali Rawat, Samriddhi Shukla, Advocates
For the Defendants: Rohan Ahuja, Sugandha Chhibber, Akshay Maloo, Gyandndra Rathoor, Advocates