The most controversial reality show, 'Bigg Boss' is back with Season 17. The Salman Khan-hosted show premiered recently. The Delhi High Court restrained the unauthorised broadcast of the show.
As per news agency PTI, the court said that the mushrooming of websites illegally broadcasting its content would boost piracy, "causing heavy losses to the plaintiff"
In the lawsuit filed by Viacom18 Media Private Limited, which owns the channel Colors TV, where 'Bigg Boss' is aired, said the programme enjoys "enormous popularity" and illegal dissemination of its content, irrespective of past and future seasons, would be an infringement of the plaintiff's copyright over the broadcast and reproduction rights of the show.
The plaintiff told the court that 'Bigg Boss' is aired in various formats, including in Hindi, on its television channels and OTT platform. But there are several websites with 'Bigg Boss' as their domain name, that broadcast the show in an unauthorised and non-licensed manner for viewing, which will cause a monetary dent in its business.
Justice Prathiba M Singh in a recent interim order said, "Accordingly, the defendant nos 1 to 5 are restrained from broadcasting, telecasting, streaming, retransmitting and hosting any episode of the Bigg Boss programme, which have already been telecast or which are likely to be telecast in the near future''.
The judge further said, "If any further websites with the name Bigg Boss are found by the plaintiff or any other websites which are telecasting illegally the programmes of the plaintiff, an application shall be filed impleading these websites. The present injunction shall accordingly extend to those websites as well''.
'Bigg Boss 17' is currently aired on the subscription-based platform, JioCinema and its illegal streaming on non-licenced websites would jeopardise the subscription base of the OTT platform.
Munawar Faruqui, Ankita Lokhande, Vicky Jain, Jigna Vora, Mannara Chopra, Abhishek Kumar, Neil Bhatt and Aishwarya Sharma among others are the contestants of 'BB 17'.
