Personality Rights Injunction: Protecting Name & Likeness

A personality rights injunction is a court order that stops someone from using your name, face, voice, signature or other identifiable traits, usually for money, without your permission. If a brand, a website, a seller or an AI tool is exploiting your identity, a civil court can order it to stop, take the content down, and pay damages. You do not need to be a film star to ask for this protection, though most reported cases involve well-known people whose identity carries commercial value.

This guide explains what personality rights are in India, the statutory provisions the claim is actually built from, what the courts have decided, when an injunction will be granted, the procedure and its realistic cost and timeline, and the mistakes that cost claimants the urgency they need. India has no single statute titled "personality rights," so courts assemble the remedy from constitutional privacy, trade mark law, passing off, copyright and the intermediary rules. That makes early, well-pleaded legal action especially important.

What are personality rights in India?

"Personality rights" is an umbrella term for two related ideas:

• The right of publicity, the right to control and commercially exploit the distinctive attributes of your own identity, including your name, image, likeness, voice, signature, catchphrases and recognisable persona. Others should not cash in on your identity without consent.
• The right to privacy and dignity, the right not to have your identity used in a false, demeaning or misleading way, even where money is not the motive.

The two overlap but are not the same, and the distinction has practical consequences. The publicity limb needs commercial recognition and is easiest for celebrities. The privacy and dignity limb belongs to everyone, which is why an ordinary person targeted by a morphed image is not without a remedy.

The statutory framework, section by section

Because there is no dedicated Personality Rights Act, a plaint in this area typically pleads several sources at once. The provisions below are the ones that carry the weight.

Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021 deserves particular emphasis, because it is the fastest tool in the box and the least used. It requires an intermediary, within twenty-four hours of a complaint by the individual or someone on their behalf, to take all reasonable and practicable measures to remove or disable access to content that is prima facie in the nature of impersonation in electronic form, expressly including artificially morphed images of that individual. For a deepfake or a morphed photograph, that obligation can produce a takedown long before a court is even approached, and a documented failure to comply strengthens the urgency argument if you do go to court.

A note on changing law: the older criminal codes have been replaced. The Indian Penal Code is now the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023, the Code of Criminal Procedure is now the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, and the Indian Evidence Act is now the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam (BSA), 2023. Many provisions were renumbered. Cheating is Section 318 of the BNS (Section 415 read with Section 420 of the IPC), cheating by personation is Section 319 (Sections 416 and 419 of the IPC), and defamation is Section 356 (Sections 499 and 500 of the IPC). The civil statutes cited above retain their existing numbering. Always verify the current section before relying on it.

What the courts have decided

The case law has moved quickly, and the last three years have done more than the preceding thirty.

R. Rajagopal v. State of Tamil Nadu, decided by the Supreme Court on 7 October 1994 and widely known as the Auto Shankar case, is the starting point. It recognised a right to privacy in the personality of a citizen, including the right to be let alone in relation to family, marriage and procreation, subject to a public-record exception. It is the earliest Indian authority most personality rights plaints still cite.

Justice K.S. Puttaswamy (Retd.) v. Union of India, decided by nine judges of the Supreme Court on 24 August 2017 and reported at 2017 (10) SCC 1, established privacy as a fundamental right flowing from Article 21. It is the constitutional foundation on which the dignity limb of the modern claim rests.

Jaikishan Kakubhai Saraf alias Jackie Shroff v. The Peppy Store, CS(COMM) 389/2024, decided by the Delhi High Court on 15 May 2024, is a personality and publicity rights suit brought under Order XXXIX Rules 1 and 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure, with John Doe defendants and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology impleaded so that the orders could actually be implemented across platforms. That last feature is the practical lesson: an order is only as good as the machinery available to enforce it against anonymous online sellers.

Karan Johar v. Indiapride Advisory Pvt Ltd, decided by the Bombay High Court on 13 June 2024, is a further example of a court restraining commercial exploitation of a public figure's name and identity.

Arijit Singh v. Codible Ventures LLP, decided by the Bombay High Court on 26 July 2024, is the AI landmark. The court granted an ad-interim and dynamic injunction protecting a performer's name, voice, image, likeness and persona against AI voice-cloning platforms, with unknown infringers impleaded as Ashok Kumar or John Doe defendants. The significance is that voice cloning was treated as an actionable appropriation of persona, not merely as a copyright question.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan v. Aishwaryaworld.Com, an order of the Delhi High Court dated 9 September 2025, continues the same trajectory into domain names and impersonating websites.

Read together, these decisions show three things. Indian courts will grant relief quickly where identity is being exploited commercially. They will extend it to AI-generated voice and imagery. And they are increasingly willing to make the order operable against unknown defendants and against the infrastructure that hosts them.

In short, this is what each of the leading decisions contributes.

What a personality rights injunction actually does

An injunction is a court order directing a party to do, or stop doing, something. In a personality rights case it typically requires the wrongdoer to:

• Stop using the claimant's name, photograph, voice or likeness.
• Take down offending posts, advertisements, products, listings or websites.
• Refrain from registering or operating domain names or social-media handles that impersonate the claimant.
• Disclose how the material was used and account for any profits earned.
• Deliver up or destroy infringing stock, packaging and promotional material.

Courts can grant an interim (temporary) injunction at an early stage, often within days in urgent matters, and a permanent injunction after the suit is decided. Alongside the injunction, a claimant may seek damages, delivery-up or destruction of infringing material, and costs.

The "John Doe" or Ashok Kumar order

Where the wrongdoers are unknown or too numerous to name, for example dozens of anonymous sellers, fake handles or pirate sites, courts can pass a John Doe order, called an Ashok Kumar order in India. This binds unidentified defendants described by their conduct, so that as each new infringer is found, the existing order can be enforced against them without filing a fresh suit each time. It is a standard tool in celebrity and right of publicity disputes, and it was used in both the Jackie Shroff and Arijit Singh matters.

Dynamic injunctions

A related development is the dynamic injunction, under which the order extends to mirror sites, redirects and newly discovered URLs that appear after the order is passed, usually on the claimant filing an affidavit identifying them. Without it, an injunction against an online infringer is often obsolete within a week, because the same operator simply reappears at a new address.

When will a court grant the injunction? The three classic tests

For an interim injunction, an Indian court weighs three well-settled factors. The same framework applies to personality rights claims.

A fourth practical consideration is urgency. Courts move faster where the misuse is live, spreading or commercially damaging, for instance a fake endorsement going viral. Urgency is also legally significant for another reason, explained under procedure below.

Who can claim personality rights?

The remedy is most readily granted to people whose identity has acquired commercial or public recognition: actors, sportspersons, musicians, public figures, and increasingly digital creators and influencers. The core requirement is identifiability, meaning the public must be able to recognise that the name, image or persona refers to you.

That said, the underlying privacy and dignity protections are available to ordinary individuals too. A private person whose photograph is morphed into a fake advertisement, or whose image is used in a deepfake, can sue to restrain misuse and protect dignity, even without celebrity status, and can additionally invoke Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021 for a twenty-four hour takedown. The commercial publicity element is what is harder to prove for a non-public person, so the claim is usually framed around dignity and misuse rather than lost licensing revenue.

Common situations that trigger a claim

• A brand uses a celebrity's photo or name in advertising without a contract.
• Counterfeit merchandise carries someone's image, signature or catchphrase.
• Websites or apps sell fake autographed goods or impersonate a public figure.
• A deepfake injunction is sought because AI-generated video or audio fabricates a person saying or endorsing something.
• An AI platform offers voice cloning of a named singer or actor, as in the Arijit Singh matter.
• Fake social-media accounts impersonate a person to defraud followers.
• Domain names are registered incorporating a person's name to attract traffic.
• A morphed or obscene image damages a private individual's dignity, where celebrity image misuse principles extend to ordinary people through the privacy limb.

Personality rights vs defamation vs copyright

People often confuse these overlapping remedies. They can be pleaded together, but they protect different things.

A single misuse, say a fake endorsement video, may breach personality rights, amount to passing off, infringe performer's rights and be defamatory all at once. A good plaint usually pleads the strongest combination rather than betting on one theory.

Step by step: what to do if your name or likeness is misused

1. Preserve evidence first. Take dated screenshots, save URLs, download the video or audio file, capture the seller or account details, and note reach in views, shares and follower counts. Evidence disappears fast online, and a court cannot restrain what you cannot show it.
2. Get the evidence into admissible form. Electronic records are now governed by the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023. Arrange the certificate that the Act requires for electronic evidence at the point of collection rather than at the trial stage.
3. Complain to the platform's grievance officer. Under Rule 3(2)(a)(i) of the IT Rules, 2021 the complaint must be acknowledged within twenty-four hours and resolved within fifteen days. Where the content is impersonation or an artificially morphed image, Rule 3(2)(b) requires removal within twenty-four hours.
4. Escalate to the Grievance Appellate Committee under Rule 3A if the platform does not act. The paper trail of non-compliance is itself useful.
5. Send a cease-and-desist notice. A clear notice to the infringer, and separately to the platform, often achieves takedown without litigation and strengthens the urgency argument if you later sue.
6. Decide the forum. These suits are ordinarily filed on the commercial side of the High Court or the appropriate commercial court, because intellectual property disputes fall within the Commercial Courts Act, 2015.
7. Consider pre-institution mediation. Section 12A of the Commercial Courts Act, 2015 requires pre-institution mediation, but the Delhi High Court held in Chandra Kishore Chaurasia v. R A Perfumery Works Private Limited, decided on 27 October 2022, that the requirement does not apply to a suit that contemplates urgent interim relief. Plead the urgency properly, because a suit filed without mediation and without genuine urgency is vulnerable.
8. File the suit with an interim injunction application under Order XXXIX Rules 1 and 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, seeking an urgent order restraining the misuse and, where appropriate, a John Doe and dynamic injunction.
9. Implead the right parties. The known infringer, John Doe defendants for the unknown ones, the platforms and domain registrars whose cooperation you need, and where appropriate the relevant Ministry so that blocking directions can be implemented.
10. Ask for disclosure and an account of profits where the infringer earned money from your identity, and seek damages including, in an appropriate case, exemplary damages.
11. Comply with the order's own conditions. An ex parte injunction carries obligations on the plaintiff, including prompt service of the order and papers on the defendant and filing the required affidavit. Failure here is the commonest way a hard-won order is vacated.
12. Add criminal remedies if relevant. A complaint under Section 318 or 319 of the BNS, 2023 for cheating or cheating by personation, or under the Information Technology Act, 2000, may run in parallel where there is fraud or obscene content.

Three deadlines under the IT Rules, and one procedural gate, decide how fast that sequence moves.

Costs and timelines: indicative ranges

The figures below are indicative and vary widely with the court, the seniority of counsel and the number of defendants. Court fees are governed by State legislation and by the rules of the court in which the suit is filed.

Two economic realities are worth naming. First, most of the practical value is captured in the first three weeks, through the takedown and the ad-interim order, not in the final decree years later. Second, damages against anonymous online sellers are frequently uncollectable, so the injunction and the platform-level enforcement are usually the real remedy.

The mistakes people actually make

• Complaining before capturing. The moment you send a notice, the content often vanishes and reappears elsewhere. Screenshot, download and record the URLs first.
• Sitting on it for months. Delay is the single most damaging fact in an interim injunction application. A claimant who waited six months has trouble arguing that the harm is irreparable and immediate.
• Skipping the platform route. Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021 can produce a twenty-four hour takedown for impersonation and morphed images at no cost. Going straight to court forgoes both the speed and the useful record of non-compliance.
• Not pleading urgency properly. Because Section 12A of the Commercial Courts Act, 2015 requires pre-institution mediation, a suit that does not genuinely contemplate urgent interim relief can be sent back. Urgency has to be pleaded on facts, not asserted.
• Suing only one seller. Online infringement is usually many-headed. Without John Doe defendants and a dynamic injunction, you will be back in court every fortnight.
• Ignoring the intermediaries and registrars. An order that does not bind the platform or the domain registrar can be very difficult to give effect to.
• Failing to prove identifiability. The plaint must show that the public associates the attribute with you. Prior endorsements, licensing agreements, media coverage and registered marks all help.
• Overpleading damages. A large damages figure raises the court fee immediately and is rarely recovered from anonymous defendants. Plead a figure you can justify.
• Neglecting the post-order obligations. Ex parte orders come with conditions on service and compliance, and non-compliance is a standard ground on which defendants apply to vacate.
• Assuming a registered trade mark is essential. It is not. Section 27(2) of the Trade Marks Act, 1999 expressly preserves the passing-off action for an unregistered persona.
• Forgetting the performer's right. Where a voice or performance has been cloned, Sections 38 and 38A of the Copyright Act, 1957 give a statutory claim that is often stronger and easier to plead than the common-law publicity right.

Key takeaway. Capture the evidence before you complain to anyone. A notice to the platform or the infringer usually makes the content vanish and reappear at a new address, so take dated screenshots, download the file and record every URL first. A court cannot restrain what you cannot show it.

A practitioner's note

The pattern that repeats in this work is that the legal merits are usually the easy part and the timing is everything. Courts in Delhi and Bombay have shown, repeatedly and recently, that they will act quickly against identity misuse, including AI-generated voice and imagery. What decides whether a claimant gets that benefit is the state of the file on the day it is presented. An application supported by dated screenshots, downloaded copies of the offending video or audio, a schedule of URLs and seller identities, a platform grievance reference showing the intermediary was told and did nothing, and clear material establishing that the public associates the attribute with the claimant, tends to secure an ad-interim order at the first hearing. An application built on a printout taken the previous evening, without any of that, tends to get a notice and a date three weeks away, by which time the campaign has run its course. The other point worth making candidly to clients is about expectations on money. Damages are pleaded and sometimes awarded, but against anonymous sellers and offshore AI platforms the realistic prize is a broad, enforceable, dynamic injunction that the platforms will act on. No lawyer can promise a particular result; what good representation does is build the record and move while the harm is still fresh.

Frequently asked questions

Yes, to an extent. The commercial right of publicity mainly helps people with public recognition, but the privacy and dignity protections, for example against deepfakes, morphed images or impersonation, are available to everyone. A non-celebrity usually frames the claim around privacy, dignity and misuse rather than lost commercial value, and can also invoke Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021 for a rapid takedown.

No. There is no single Personality Rights Act. Courts build the remedy from the constitutional right to privacy under Article 21, the Trade Marks Act, 1999 including passing off under Section 27(2), the Copyright Act, 1957 including performer's rights under Sections 38 and 38A, the IT Rules, 2021, and tort law, with procedure under the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908.

It is an injunction against unknown or unnamed defendants, described by their conduct. It lets a claimant enforce the order against new infringers, such as anonymous sellers or fake accounts, as they are identified, without filing a fresh suit each time.

Often yes. Courts have restrained AI-generated and morphed content that misuses a person's face or voice, relying on privacy, dignity and, for public figures, publicity rights. In addition, Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021 obliges an intermediary to remove impersonation content, including artificially morphed images, within twenty-four hours of a complaint. Speed and preserved evidence matter, because such content spreads quickly.

Yes. The Bombay High Court's order of 26 July 2024 in Arijit Singh v. Codible Ventures LLP protected a performer's name, voice, image, likeness and persona against AI voice-cloning platforms. Sections 38 and 38A of the Copyright Act, 1957 give an additional statutory route where a performance has been recorded or reproduced.

This is unsettled in India and decided case by case. Some courts have been willing to protect a deceased person's identity in limited circumstances, while others treat publicity rights as personal and not freely inheritable. Get specific advice for an estate or legacy dispute.

In a genuinely urgent matter, meaning live, spreading and commercially damaging misuse, an ad-interim injunction can be obtained quickly, sometimes within days of filing. Routine matters follow the normal civil timeline.

Section 12A of the Commercial Courts Act, 2015 requires pre-institution mediation for commercial suits, but the Delhi High Court held in Chandra Kishore Chaurasia v. R A Perfumery Works Private Limited on 27 October 2022 that the requirement does not apply where the suit contemplates urgent interim relief. Personality rights suits are usually filed on that footing, so the urgency must be genuine and properly pleaded.

Takedown and delivery-up or destruction of infringing material, restraint on related domains and handles, blocking directions where appropriate, disclosure and an account of profits, monetary damages, and costs.

No. Section 27(2) of the Trade Marks Act, 1999 preserves the passing-off action for an unregistered mark or persona. A registration helps, and Section 14 stops others from registering a mark that falsely suggests a connection with a living person without written consent, but neither is a precondition to an injunction.

Yes, where the facts support it. Cheating is Section 318 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, cheating by personation is Section 319, and defamation is Section 356. Offences under the Information Technology Act, 2000 may also apply. A criminal complaint runs alongside the civil suit and does not replace the injunction, which is what actually stops the misuse.

Related guides and where to get help

If this is a live problem rather than background reading, our intellectual property practice handles these matters from Bengaluru, including for clients who cannot attend court in person. These guides go deeper on the neighbouring questions:

• Personality Rights in India: Protecting Your Name & Image
• Who Owns a Bollywood Song? Copyright, Producers, Music Labels and "Legacy Rights" Explained
• Can Competitors Bid on Your Brand Name? Google Ads, Trademark Keywords and Well-Known Marks