Bollywood star Jackie Shroff recently moved to Delhi High Court seeking protection of his personality and publicity rights. The case was filed against various entities using his name, photographs, voice, and word ‘Bhidu’ as well as creating ‘insulting’ memes and GIFs and also the use of artificial intelligence without his consent. This is not the first time that a Bollywood actor has sought help from the court for privacy and publicity rights. Before Jackie, several other Bollywood stars have protected their personality rights legally. So, why do these stars are protecting their personality rights suddenly?

What forced these stars to protect their personality rights?

The use of image, voice and unique style of Bollywood stars is not new, so, why these stars are suddenly protecting their personality rights legally? There may be multiple reasons behind protecting their rights and among the top could be anticipated that they are saving themselves from the latest technology of Artificial Intelligence (AI). In recent times, several Bollywood stars have fallen victim to AI and deepfake technology after their morphed pictures and videos went viral on social media.

Another reason which can be considered is that these stars don’t want the illegal use of their images, voices and names for commercial purposes. A third one which can be speculated as the reason behind protecting such rights is that some of the stars are not comfortable with how people use their style of speaking or their popular catchphrases. 

Stars who have protected their personality rights?

Earlier veteran actor Amitabh Bachchan approached Mumbai High Court to stop people from mimicking the actor and using his voice without consent. Apart from him, Anil Kapoor also approached the Delhi High Court to protect his personality rights last year. Moreover, this January, Anil won the case and sought the protection of the ‘Jhakaas’ catchphrase, his name, voice, manner of speaking, image, likeness, and gestures.