Sony Music Entertainment India Pvt Ltd has locked horns with music maestro Ilaiyaraaja’s ‘Ilaiyaraaja Music N Management Pvt Ltd’ (IMM) in a copyright infringement action filed in the Bombay High Court seeking injunctive relief and relief. permanent damages of Rs 1.5 crore from IMM.
Sriram Bhakrisaran and Ilaiyaraaja are directors of IMM, however, the latter is not a party to suing Sony.
The complaint claims that winner Padma Bhushan’s company, by releasing music, infringes at least 228 of the 536 title albums acquired by Sony through a series of transactions with various third parties. Sony specifies that the exploitation was brought to its attention in December 2021, hence the urgency.
He requested interim measures to prevent IMM from live-streaming or asserting any rights to receive royalties from the 536 tracks acquired by them and from disclosing any agreements reached regarding the track albums.
In the responding affidavit, IMM accused Sony of establishing “false urgency” because the maestro’s works (including compositions Sony claims to own) have been distributed by “Trend Loud Digital” since 2015.
IMM cited the order of a divisional bench of Madras HC in which the court suspended the decree passed against Ilaiyaraaja in respect of 310 titles composed by him out of the 536 titles.
IMM said Sony was aware of the cast when it negotiated Ilaiyaraaja’s entire repertoire of works last year. In fact, a non-disclosure agreement was signed by the parties in December 2021, but the negotiations did not materialize into an agreement.
“It is plain and clear beyond reasonable doubt that the plaintiff (Sony) has derived the entire metadata from IMM [during negotiations]. The work and the details require considerable effort, research and take an enormous amount of time. It took more than 4 years for IMM to bring it to this stage.
“This plaintiff (Sony) without any such effort is simply using the data received from the defendant, which was otherwise available on Ilaiyaraajya’s official YouTube channel since 2014-16 and simply offering to upload it to his own YouTube channel. with a view to making illegal gains and undue enrichment,” says IMM.
The lawsuit filed in January 2022 will be heard for interim relief on March 31, 2022 seeking directions to restrain winner Padma Bhushan’s company from exploiting several of his own compositions.
Ilaiyaraaja is suing for his work
According to the complaint, Echo Recording Company Pvt Ltd obtained the copyrights to 536 albums of titles from various film producers who were the original owners of such a work composed by Dr Ilaiyaraaja and others.
Echo then transferred the rights to Oriental Records USA in February 2020 and from there, through a catalog acquisition agreement, Sony Music acquired the rights to the sound recordings the same month.
However, Ilaiyaraaja sued Echo claiming right, title and interest in over 310 songs composed by him. The Madras High Court held that Echo was the legal owner of the sound recordings and had the right to exploit them.
The court, however, upheld Ilaiyaraaya’s moral rights to his compositions. While Sony cited the Madras High Court judgment in its complaint to the Bombay High Court in January 2022, earlier this month a Madras HC division bench suspended the decree after lawyers for Ilaiyaraaja said the lawsuit was filed without their counterclaim. The case will now be heard on March 28, 2022.
In the reply, Sony claimed that out of the 536 title albums, 192 albums are not composed by Ilaiyaraaja. While IMM has clearly claimed that 310 titles belong to Ilaiyaraaja, the ownership of 34 titles remains to be determined.
While Sony claims to want to acquire the rights to the entire catalog of Ilaiyaraaja’s work (excluding some of the album titles he indirectly purchased from Echo), IMMPL states that the negotiations related to the 310 titles in dispute.
The case will now be heard for interim measures.
Sony Music Entertainment India Pvt Ltd has locked horns with music maestro Ilaiyaraaja’s ‘Ilaiyaraaja Music N Management Pvt Ltd’ (IMM) in a copyright infringement action filed in the Bombay High Court seeking injunctive relief and relief. permanent damages of Rs 1.5 crore from IMM.
Sriram Bhakrisaran and Ilaiyaraaja are directors of IMM, however, the latter is not a party to suing Sony.
The complaint claims that winner Padma Bhushan’s company, by releasing music, infringes at least 228 of the 536 title albums acquired by Sony through a series of transactions with various third parties. Sony specifies that the exploitation was brought to its attention in December 2021, hence the urgency.
He requested interim measures to prevent IMM from live-streaming or asserting any rights to receive royalties from the 536 tracks acquired by them and from disclosing any agreements reached regarding the track albums.
In the responding affidavit, IMM accused Sony of establishing “false urgency” because the maestro’s works (including compositions Sony claims to own) have been distributed by “Trend Loud Digital” since 2015.
IMM cited the order of a divisional bench of Madras HC in which the court suspended the decree passed against Ilaiyaraaja in respect of 310 titles composed by him out of the 536 titles.
IMM said Sony was aware of the cast when it negotiated Ilaiyaraaja’s entire repertoire of works last year. In fact, a non-disclosure agreement was signed by the parties in December 2021, but the negotiations did not materialize into an agreement.
“It is plain and clear beyond reasonable doubt that the plaintiff (Sony) has derived the entire metadata from IMM [during negotiations]. The work and the details require considerable effort, research and take an enormous amount of time. It took more than 4 years for IMM to bring it to this stage.
“This plaintiff (Sony) without any such effort is simply using the data received from the defendant, which was otherwise available on Ilaiyaraajya’s official YouTube channel since 2014-16 and simply offering to upload it to his own YouTube channel. with a view to making illegal gains and undue enrichment,” says IMM.
The lawsuit filed in January 2022 will be heard for interim relief on March 31, 2022 seeking directions to restrain winner Padma Bhushan’s company from exploiting several of his own compositions.
Ilaiyaraaja is suing for his work
According to the complaint, Echo Recording Company Pvt Ltd obtained the copyrights to 536 albums of titles from various film producers who were the original owners of such a work composed by Dr Ilaiyaraaja and others.
Echo then transferred the rights to Oriental Records USA in February 2020 and from there, through a catalog acquisition agreement, Sony Music acquired the rights to the sound recordings the same month.
However, Ilaiyaraaja sued Echo claiming right, title and interest in over 310 songs composed by him. The Madras High Court held that Echo was the legal owner of the sound recordings and had the right to exploit them.
The court, however, upheld Ilaiyaraaya’s moral rights to his compositions. While Sony cited the Madras High Court judgment in its complaint to the Bombay High Court in January 2022, earlier this month a Madras HC division bench suspended the decree after lawyers for Ilaiyaraaja said the lawsuit was filed without their counterclaim. The case will now be heard on March 28, 2022.
In the reply, Sony claimed that out of the 536 title albums, 192 albums are not composed by Ilaiyaraaja. While IMM has clearly claimed that 310 titles belong to Ilaiyaraaja, the ownership of 34 titles remains to be determined.
While Sony claims to want to acquire the rights to the entire catalog of Ilaiyaraaja’s work (excluding some of the album titles he indirectly purchased from Echo), IMMPL states that the negotiations related to the 310 titles in dispute.
The case will now be heard for interim measures.