Vir Das in legal soup, faces copyright violation

As per the FIR, on October 14, 2010, the complainant’s company signed a contract with Das to produce a new show, titled “History of India VIRitten.” Das had allegedly agreed to write the script, direct and act in the show. It was duly developed and was also performed at the St Andrews auditorium on September 14, 2011.

Mumbai: Stand-up comic Vir Das’s much-lauded Netflix special, For India, has run into legal trouble after the Cuffe Parade police registered a first information report (FIR) based on a complaint lodged by renowned theatre producer Ashvin Gidwani, alleging that 12 jokes from the show were copied from the script of an earlier show produced by him and performed by Das.

An FIR has been registered for the reproduction of a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work in the form of a cinematograph film in violation of copyright under the Copyright Act, 1957. (HT PHOTO)

According to the police, the FIR was registered last week based on a complaint submitted by Gidwani in September. Gidwani is the producer of several successful plays, including Devdas - The Musical, 2 To Tango, 3 To Jive; Blame It On Yashraj, Good Mourning, Barff, Mirror Mirror, The Scent Of A Man and Bottoms Up. Gidwani’s company has also produced comedy specials, including Walking On Broken Das featuring Das.

As per the FIR, on October 14, 2010, Gidwani’s company signed a contract with Das to produce a new show, titled “History of India VIRitten.” Das had allegedly agreed to write the script, direct and act in the show. It was duly developed and was also performed at the St Andrews auditorium on September 14, 2011. The show went on to be a success and had over 100 shows in India subsequently.

“In 2019, it was decided to sign a new agreement between our company and Das, according to which, the same show would be telecast on Netflix, with a few changes,” Gidwani said in his statement to the police.

It was discussed between them via email, he added. However, for some reason, Das abandoned the discussion but took the same concept and parts of the same show to develop his special.

“I saw a promo for the special –titled Vir Das: For India – on Netflix on January 23, 2020, and realised that one of the jokes he made had been copied from ‘History of India VIRitten’, with a few changes,” said Gidwani.

The same day, Gidwani issued a notice to Das and Netflix for copyright violation, to which he replied the next day saying that there had been no violation on his part. Subsequently, on January 26, 2020, the show was released on Netflix and became wildly popular.

“After the show was released, I realised that a total of 12 jokes were copied,” Gidwani has further told the police in his statement.

The police registered an FIR against Das, Netflix and the directors of For India on November 4. It has been registered for the reproduction of a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work in the form of a cinematograph film in violation of copyright under the Copyright Act, 1957.

HT reached out to Gidwani and Das but received no response.