Delhi High Court Recognises and Protects Karan Johar’s Personality Rights, Orders Removal of Infringing Content
The leading law firm in India, DSK Legal, filed a suit before the Hon’ble Delhi High Court on behalf of acclaimed filmmaker Karan Johar, seeking, inter alia, a permanent injunction restraining the misappropriation of his personality and publicity rights, infringement of copyright and performer’s rights, acts of passing off and tarnishment, as well as reliefs of damages, rendition of accounts, delivery up, and other consequential reliefs.
Introduction/Background
Karan Johar is one of the most acclaimed and successful directors in the Indian film industry. Having made his directorial debut at the young age of 25, he has since directed, produced, and/or written several critically and commercially acclaimed blockbusters. In addition to being a renowned filmmaker and one of the most influential figures in the industry today, the Plaintiff is also a well-known television personality, talk show host, costume designer, and actor. His talk show, Koffee With Karan, holds the distinction of being the most watched English talk show on Indian television.
It is the Plaintiff’s case that his personality and attributes are uniquely identifiable only with him and he enjoys exclusive Personality Rights / Publicity Rights over all aspects of his persona. The law acknowledges that a celebrity has exclusive authority over the commercial exploitation of his personality. Accordingly, no person is entitled to utilize, misappropriate, imitate, or commercially exploit any facet of any celebrity/personality without his consent or express authorization.
It is the Plaintiff’s case that, given his goodwill and reputation, he is exclusively entitled to commercially exploit his brand name ‘Karan Johar’ and his attributes.
The Plaintiff submitted that his Personality and Publicity Rights are being violated in multiple ways, including:
(i) Websites misappropriating his identity to gain popularity and induce downloads;
(ii) Unauthorized use of his image and attributes on products and merchandise to create a false nexus or sponsorship;
(iii) Circulation of morphed, superimposed, or AI-generated content and fictionalized avatars without consent, aimed at misleading the public and commercially exploiting his goodwill; and
(iv) Impersonation and cybersquatting through registration of infringing domain names and social media handles bearing his name or abbreviation, thereby deceiving the public into believing a false association with him.
Court Proceedings
Accordingly, aggrieved by the aforesaid, the Plaintiff moved the Hon’ble Delhi High Court. The captioned matter was listed before Hon’ble Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora on September 15 and 17, 2025, for hearing of ad-interim/interim reliefs.
The Court carefully went through the list of URLs and posts submitted by the parties, examining each entry individually. It further observed that such comments are an inevitable consequence of being in the public domain, noting that even the judiciary itself is not immune from facing similar remarks.
Court’s Order
On September 17, 2025, the Hon’ble Delhi High Court passed an order in favour of the Plaintiff, recognising his personality rights and granting ad-interim protection. The Court held that derogatory and obscene memes and posts using the Plaintiff’s persona do not fall within the ambit of fair comment and directed their immediate removal.
The Court specifically ordered:
( a.) Restrained infringing parties from misusing Mr. Johar’s personality rights and to take down all infringing URLs containing Mr. Johar’s name, acronym “KJo”, likeness, image, voice, signature style, or any other aspect of his persona, including through AI, deep fakes, face morphing, GIFs, memes, or merchandise;
( b.) Directed major platforms including Google, YouTube, Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Threads), X (formerly Twitter), Pinterest, Giphy, Tenor, Amazon, Etsy, and RedBubble to take down derogatory, obscene, and infringing content within one week;
( c.) Ordered suspension of infringing domain names and unauthorized AI tools misusing his persona;
( d.) Directed e-commerce platforms to delist products and merchandise unlawfully using Mr. Johar’s attributes; and
( e.) Recognised that derogatory and obscene memes and posts which cross the line of decency fall outside the protection of “fair comment.”
Next Steps
The matter is next listed on February 19, 2026.
Legal Representation
Karan Johar was represented by DSK Legal, with Senior Counsel Rajshekhar Rao and Counsel Nizamuddin Pasha appearing as external counsels. The DSK Legal team comprised Parag Khandhar (Partner) and Chandrima Mitra (Partner). From Dharma Productions, Rakhee Bajpai, Chief Legal Officer, also provided key support in the matter.
Conclusion
The Delhi High Court’s order in favour of Karan Johar reinforces the judiciary’s consistent approach in safeguarding celebrity personality rights from unauthorized exploitation, misuse, and AI-driven distortions. This ruling follows similar recent decisions protecting Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, highlighting a growing judicial recognition of the need to preserve the dignity, reputation, and commercial rights of public figures in the digital age.
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