The FD Block puja pandal. A Telegraph picture

The pandal raised as a tribute to “the boy who lived” has survived. Delhi High Court on Friday gave the go-ahead to the FD Block puja in Salt Lake, which has erected a pandal modelled on Harry Potter’s school, Hogwarts.

The court has ruled that the castle will not have to be dismantled before October 26, well after Puja gets over. It refused to issue a restrain order asking the FD Block Sarbojanin Puja Committee from using any Harry Potter-related characters, castles or replicas.

Dismantling of the structure would mean interfering with the pujas, the court said, rejecting the prayer. But it clarified that any “further (beyond October 26) use will be subject to prior permission of the author of the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling, and Warner Brothers (the distributors)”.

A Delhi-based law firm, representing Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, had filed the petition claiming that the organisers and the proprietor of Mondal Decorators, the pandal-makers, had violated the Copyright Act, 1957. It also sought a compensation of Rs 20 lakh.

On Friday, the puja organisers, through their counsel, told the court that the event was meant for the public. “The organisers are a non-profit body… and the event is being held for charitable purposes…,” the lawyers, Soumitra Ghosh Chaudhuri and Dipak Nag, said. Rowling’s lawyers had argued that the organisers were making money from the event through hoardings and posters. But the court rejected that argument.

The puja committee members, who were at their wit’s end after receiving the summons on Wednesday, are breathing easy. “Evil forces have been defeated by the grace of Ma Durga,” said FD Block puja committee president Hiranmoy Roychowdhury.

The committee, which had earlier cancelled some of its Potter plans, including using figures of Harry Potter, his owl Hedwig and his enemy Voldemort, has now decided to go forward. “We lost two days. It is now a race against time,” secretary Santanu Biswas said.