Court will decide fate of Congress leader Ramya’s debut as film producer

S Shyam Prasad | NT

Bengaluru: Actress turned politician Ramya’ s maiden venture as a film producer has landed in court. Veteran director Rajendra Singh Babu has approached a civil court in Bengaluru claiming that he has already shot a film with the same title; ‘Swathi Muttina Malehaniye’ and others should be restrained from using it for their film.

Ramya, who quit as the head of the Congress party’s social media, returned to films as a producer. Raj B Shetty is acting and directing her maiden production. “The defendants or anybody claiming under them are hereby restrained from using the title of second defendant in a name of ‘Swathi Muttina Malehaniye’.”

The XVIII Additional City Civil Judge Padma Prasad has ordered issuing an exparte temporary injunction saying the plaintiff “has made out a prima facie case”. It also issued suit summons to the defendants before February 17, 2023. Interestingly, the defendants in the case filed by Singh are the Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce, Jayadurga Movies of BK Gangadhar and the Central Board of Film Certification.

Ramya or her production house AppleBox Studios that is making the film under the said title are not parties to the case. It turns out that Gangadhar had registered the title in the Film Chamber and promised to hand it over to Ramya but this is not yet officially done.

Singh Babu, however, claims that he has registered the title. Rajendra Singh Babu approached the court stating that the title ‘Swathi Muttina Malehaniye’ is a famous song from his film ‘Bannada Gejje’ and he had registered it as a film title. He had started shooting for the film and completed 80 per cent of it before the lead actor Ambareesh died.

“The plaintiff also filed an affidavit in support of the said contention. All these documents show that the plaintiff has made out a prima-facie case in its favour,” the Court noted. The Court has, however, taken an undertaking from Singh that “in the event that the plaintiff fails in the suit, it will compensate the defendant in actual cost and loss and also pay the mesne profits to the defendant.”

The Court cited the Rameshwari Devi Vs Nirmala Devi case of the Supreme Court that held that “the court has to grant injunction in exceptional cases, then while granting injunction, it must record in order that if the suit is eventually dismissed, the plaintiffs or the petitioners will have to make full restitution, actual or realistic costs and mesne profits.”