J U D G M E N T

This judgment and order will now dispose of the captioned main suit and captioned application thereat.

2. In the captioned main suit, there is a lone plaintiff company and there are three defendants. In this judgment / order from hereon and henceforth, parties shall be referred to by their respective ranks in the main suit for the sake of convenience and clarity.

3. Captioned main suit has been filed seeking reliefs regarding rights in a Telugu cinematograph film with title 'AARADUGULA BULLET'

[hereinafter 'suit movie' for the sake of convenience and clarity].

4. 08.11.2022 and 16.11.2022 are the dates of presentation of plaint and institution of suit respectively qua captioned main suit. This means that the date of institution of captioned suit is post 20.08.2022 and therefore, law laid down by Hon'ble Supreme Court in Patil Automation case law [Patil Automation Private Limited and Others vs. Rakheja Engineers Private Limited reported in 2022 SCC OnLine SC 1028] which is an elucidation of Section 12A of 'The Commercial Courts Act, 2015 (4 of 2016)' [hereinafter 'CCA' for the sake of brevity, convenience and clarity] would apply.

5. As the captioned main suit is being tested qua adherence to mandatory requirements of Section 12A of CCA, short facts (shorn of elaboration and granular particulars) will suffice. Short facts are that the plaintiff company is in the business of aggregation and distribution business of non-theatrical film rights in the film industry besides syndication and licensing; that the plaintiff has been in such business for over 25 years; that the plaintiff entered into three agreements with second defendant, all dated 28.09.2021 [plaint document Nos.6, 7 and 8] and acquired (a) satellite, digital and other electronic rights (b) entire copyrights and (c) dubbing rights, all in suit movie; that the second defendant in turn has acquired such rights in suit movie from the third defendant vide four agreements, all dated 27.09.2021 and they are (a)satellite, digital rights (b) ownership rights (c) settlement agreement and (d) dubbing rights assignment; that the plaintiff was visited with a 'cease and desist notice' ['C & D notice' for the sake of brevity] dated 27.12.2021 [plaint document No.9] from the first defendant; that vide this C & D notice the plaintiff was inter alia called upon to take down screening of suit movie in OTT platform; that the first defendant has predicated this C & D notice on an agreement dated 16.08.2013 [plaint document No.12]; that the plaintiff sent a reply notice dated 29.12.2021 [plaint document No.10]; that the first defendant sent a rejoinder dated 04.01.2022 [plaint document No.11]; that the captioned suit has now been instituted in this Commercial Division on 16.11.2022 seeking aforementioned reliefs (to be noted plaint prayer has been extracted and reproduced below cause title supra).

6. The first defendant has lodged a caveat [caveat petition No.6253 of 2022] and Mr.K.Harishankar along with Ms.Varsha Chandrasekhar, learned counsel for caveator is before this Commercial Division.

7. Ms.Jayanthi Venkatesh, learned counsel on record for plaintiff drew the attention of this Commercial Division to the aforementioned plaint documents and submitted that C & D notice issued by first defendant is the trigger for captioned main suit, 8. On Section 12A of CCA, learned counsel for plaintiff had made only one submission and that one submission is predicated on paragraph No.13 of the plaint which reads as follows:

'13. The plaintiff also states that the third defendant also moved this honourable court and they are informed that the said suit was held against the third defendant as they no more held any rights and only this plaintiff has rights to whom the rights were transmitted from the second defendant who in turn derived it from the third defendant.'

9. To be noted, there is no mention about any suit number or date of any order or judgment in paragraph No.13. It is also to be not