Actor Abhishek Bachchan on Wednesday urged Delhi High Court to safeguard his publicity and personality rights and restrain websites and platforms from using his image, likeness, persona and fake videos, including sexually explicit material.
Abhishek’s wife and actor Aishwarya Rai Bachchan had on Tuesday approached the high court with a similar plea.
“We will pass an order,” Justice Tejas Karia said on Wednesday and listed the matter for January 15 when the court would hear Aishwarya’s plea as well.
In his petition, Abhishek sought to safeguard his name, voice, image, likeness, signature and all other facets of his persona that are distinctive and exclusively associated with him. He objected to the unauthorised use of his images and videos and said such content amounted to deception and created confusion among the public.
Abhishek’s advocate Pravin Anand showed the court “distasteful” content generated with the help of artificial intelligence and deepfake technology using his face.
“These images/ videos are not authorised by the plaintiff (Abhishek) and bring ridicule to him. The plaintiff has not been informed prior to the creation and dissemination of such videos, nor has his consent been sought or secured,” the actor submitted.
Abhishek has also urged the court to restrain multiple platforms from creating, sharing or disseminating any product, including clothes or keychains, T-shirts, coffee mugs, posters, life-size cutouts, audio-visual content, images and GIFs.