Physics Wallah Founder Alakh Pandey Moves Delhi High Court Over Alleged Misuse Of Personality Rights

Physics Wallah founder Alakh Pandey on Tuesday moved the Delhi High Court seeking protection of his personality rights against the alleged unauthorised commercial exploitation of his identity.

The court directed him to submit a defendant-wise tabulated chart classifying the alleged infringements before considering interim relief.

Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani asked Pandey to categorise the alleged violations into three classes: content commercialising or monetising his personality; content that is ex facie vulgar or sexually explicit and falls short of satire or parody; and content amounting to libel or slander, which may either be protected as free speech or be actionable outside the personality rights framework.

To establish that Pandey had a protectable personality, Senior Advocate J Sai Deepak highlighted his public profile. He submitted that Pandey has partnered with the Government of India, operates more than 300 educational centres across the country, has over 3.1 million Instagram followers and more than 14 million YouTube subscribers, and that his catchphrase, "hello bachho", along with his face and manner of speaking, have become widely recognized.

On the alleged infringement, Deepak submitted that several pages were using Pandey's personality attributes to offer discount coupons, sell commercial stickers and GIFs, and publish sexually explicit or defamatory content. He argued that the unauthorized use of Pandey's likeness and persona in such content harmed his reputation.

Counsel for Google submitted that the basic subscriber identification details of the defendants could be shared with Pandey to enable the concerned parties to appear before the court.

During the hearing, the court also questioned whether issues relating to parody, satire and defamation could appropriately be addressed within a personality rights suit, observing that the suit appeared to seek reliefs extending beyond personality rights, including matters relating to trademark, copyright and defamation.

"As of today, I am willing to pass an interim ex parte order in relation to those defendants who are monetising your name in a positive way to make money," the court remarked.

Deepak clarified that the suit was not aimed at restraining genuine criticism, humour or parody. Rather, he said, it was confined to the unauthorised commercial exploitation of Pandey's personality and content that was sexually explicit or defamatory.

The court listed the matter for further hearing on Wednesday