IRS officer, Sameer Wankhede, issued a defamation lawsuit against the makers, Netflix, Meta, XCorp, and Google for Aryan Khan’s directorial debut Ba***ds of Bollywood. While the plaint was urged to be edited with relevant claims, the Delhi High Court has issued summons to the defendants and sought their responses.
Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav also issued notice on the application for interim relief. The matter is further listed the matter for consideration on October 30.Appearing for Wankhede, Senior Adv. Sandeep Sethi presented his amended plaint. It was revealed that following the release of the series, there were “posts trolling” Wankhede, his wife, and his sister. “Ex facie defamatory. It’s shocking. They are surely not defending those posts,” remarked Sethi.
Senior Advocate appeared for Netflix, and Senior Advocate Shyel Trehan appeared for Red Chillies Entertainment to oppose the lawsuit Wankhede filed. Sameer Dyandev Wankhede vs Red Chillies Entertainment Pvt. Ltd. & Others also names XCorp (formerly Twitter), Google LLC, Meta Platforms, RPG Lifestyle Media Private Limited, and John Doe.
Wankhede’s September appeal
Earlier, Wankhede had sought Rs 2 crore in damages and claimed that the amount would be donated to cancer patients at the Tata Memorial Cancer Hospital. He alleged that scenes in Aryan Khan’s Ba***ds of Bollywood were “false, malicious, and defamatory” in nature. Thus, the suit was filed seeking a permanent and mandatory injunction against the production house and others named. The attempt to replicate was labelled as “deliberate,” in turn, an effort to tarnish his reputation in a “prejudicial and colourable manner”.
Additionally, the series also allegedly depicts a character making an obscene gesture after the character recites the slogan “satyamev jayate”. As per Wankhede’s suit, it is a grave and sensitive violation of the provisions of the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971. Further, the suit also names other provisions of the Information Technology Act and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).