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2014 Supreme(Del) 1764
High Court of Delhi
MANMOHAN SINGH, J.
Star India Pvt. Ltd. & Another
Versus
Haneeth Ujwal & Others
C.S. (OS) No. 2243 of 2014
Decided On : 28-07-2014
For the Plaintiffs:Amit Sibal, Senior Advocate with Sidharth Chopra, Sneha Jain, Prateek Chadha, Savni Dutt, Advocates.
For the Defendants: None.
The judgment establishes the power of the court to pass orders against unknown defendants in cases of infringement, and the obligation of internet service providers to prevent infringement of intellectual property rights.
Headnote:
Broadcasting Rights - Infringement - Indian Copyright Act, 1957 - Section 37
Fact of the Case:
The plaintiffs, leading sports broadcaster in India, filed a suit against various websites for hosting, streaming, and broadcasting the 2014 India-England Series Matches without authorization, infringing the plaintiffs' exclusive rights and broadcast reproduction rights.
Finding of the Court:
The court found that the plaintiffs had made a strong prima facie case for grant of ex-parte order and that the balance of convenience lay in favor of the plaintiffs.
Issues: Infringement of exclusive rights, unfair competition, commercial misappropriation, and violation of broadcast reproduction rights.
Ratio Decidendi: The court passed ad-interim orders restraining the defendant websites from hosting, streaming, and broadcasting the plaintiffs' broadcast of the 2014 India-England Series Matches, and directed the Department of Telecommunications and the Department of Electronics and Information Technology to ensure compliance with the orders.
Final Decision: The court directed the defendant websites to comply with the orders and also directed the Domain Name Registrars to disclose the contact details of the owners of the infringing websites.
MANMOHAN SINGH, J.
1. The plaintiffs have filed the suit for permanent injunction, accounts of profits, delivery up, damages etc.
2. The case of the plaintiffs is that they are leading sports broadcaster in India and the exclusive licensee of media rights to various sporting events/properties. They are also the owners of a network of sports television channels and by virtue of necessary downlink permissions from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, the plaintiff No. 2 has the sole and exclusive right to broadcast and distribute the Channels in India i.e. Star Sports 1, STAR Sports 2, Star Sports 3, STAR Sports 4, Fox Sports News, STAR Sports HD 1 and Star Sports HD 2 (collectively referred to as Star Sports Channels). All the Star Sports Channels are pay channels. The Star Sports Channels carry various exciting sporting events in the field of cricket, football, F1, Badminton, tennis, hockey etc. such as the various international & domestic cricket matches organized by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), International cricket matches organized by Cricket Australia (CA), International cricket matches organised by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), cricket matches & tournaments organized by International Cricket Council (ICC), Champions League Twenty 20, Wimbledon, Australian Open, Barclays Premier League, Spanish La Liga, Italian Serie A, F1, Hockey India League, Indian Badminton League.
3. The plaintiffs have internet and mobile presence through plaintiff No.2’s website/ mobile application www.starsports.com and the starsports.com app which is a dedicated digital sports entertainment service (transmitted through internet and mobile) on which the digital rights to various sporting events/properties are exploited/displayed by the plaintiff. These internet services through www.starsports.com are an online destination that brings the best of live sports in India. It offers to viewers, sports content on live, delayed live, video on demand and pay per view basis. The internet services through www.starsports.com are accessible from a browser on a laptop, personal computer or any hand-held device.
4. The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) is a company limited by guarantee established under the laws of England and was created on 01st January 1997. It was created by combining the roles of the Test and County Cricket Board, the National Cricket Association and the Cricket Council as the single national governing body for all cricket in England and Wales. The ECB is responsible for the management and development of every form of cricket for men and women in England and Wales. This includes clubs, schools, juniors and youth, disabilities cricket, representative, first class and international cricket. The ECB, as a part of its duties and responsibilities, is organising the tour of the Indian national men’s cricket team to England for the India-England Series 2014. The series is going to be played between 09th July, 2014 to 07th September, 2014 and comprises of 05 (five) test matches, 05 (five) one day internationals and 01 (one) Twenty 20 match. The schedule of matches/events for the India-England Series 2014 is filed herewith.
5. The plaintiff No. 1 has been granted the exclusive Television Rights, Internet Rights, Mobile Rights and On-Demand Rights in respect of the India-England Series 2014 for various territories across the world, including but not limited to Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka to name a few. More specifically, the plaintiff No. 1 has been granted on an exclusive basis, the license to exploit the following (hereinafter referred to as the Broadcasting Rights):
(i) Television Rights by means of cable, terrestrial (analogue and digital), DTH and/or IPTV transmission.
(ii) Internet Rights by means of the Internet to any device capable of accessing the Internet.
(iii) Mobile Rights by means of Mobile Technology to any Mobile Devices including through Mob
