The BRICS TimesBollywood star Aishwarya Rai Bachchan moved the Delhi High Court, demanding legal protection over her name, pictures, voice, and personal traits.
The Delhi High Court has stepped in to secure Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s personality rights, stopping misuse of her identity without approval. The court restrained individuals and businesses from profiting by using her name, images, or voice without consent. The bench stressed that exploiting a celebrity’s persona not only brings financial loss but also violates their right to live with dignity.
Justice Tejas Karia issued the ruling on Bachchan’s plea, where she sought protection for her personal traits including her name, likeness, voice, and other attributes. In her petition, Aishwarya alleged that several people were misusing her rights by using her videos, morphing her images with artificial intelligence, and even linking her identity to offensive content for commercial benefit.
The court’s 16-page order directed all parties to take down web links violating her personality rights within 72 hours. Justice Karia noted that unauthorized use of her identity could mislead the public and create a false belief that she endorsed such content.
“When the identity of a famous personality is used without their consent or authorisation, it may not only lead to commercial detriment to the concerned individual but also impact their right to live with dignity. In other words, the unauthorised exploitation of the attributes of an individual’s personality may have two facets – first, violation of their right to protect their personality attributes from being commercially exploited; and second, violation of their right to privacy, which in turn leads to undermining their right to live with dignity,” the court observed, while fixing January 15 as the next hearing date.
The judge also underlined that courts cannot ignore such violations, adding that legal protection must be given to prevent damage from unauthorized exploitation.
Interestingly, the verdict came just a day after the same bench safeguarded the personality rights of Bollywood actor Abhishek Bachchan. In earlier instances, the court has protected several actors. In May 2024, it secured Jackie Shroff’s rights against commercial misuse of his persona through distorted videos and merchandise. In 2023, actor Anil Kapoor won a similar case when the court restricted unauthorized use of his name, photos, voice, and his iconic “jhakaas” phrase. Likewise, in November 2022, Amitabh Bachchan received protection over his publicity rights.
The fresh order highlights the growing legal recognition of celebrity personality rights, especially in the age of AI and digital exploitation.
