No individual can claim copyright, authorship, or proprietary rights over historical events such as the anti-Hindi agitations, argued the producer of Parasakthi before the Madras High Court during a hearing on a plagiarism case filed against the film’s makers.
The response was filed in a counter affidavit before Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy following a case registered by Varun Rajendran (a) KV Rajendran, a script writer, who requested the court to halt the OTT release of the Sivakarthikeyan-headlined film for not giving him credit for the story.
Varun Rajendran mentioned that he had filed a case after watching the film in theatres. He claimed that the makers had plagiarised his original 56-page-long script titled 'Chemmozhi' with changes to create Parasakthi. Further, he underlined that he had already registered the story with South Indian Film Writers Association back in 2010.
Varun also urged the makers to mention his name in the credits as the “writer and original conceptualiser” of the period drama.
Dismissing his claims, advocate Vijayan Subramanian who represented Dawn Pictures, emphasised that the film takes inspiration from the anti-Hindi agitations that occured in the '60s and that Sudha Kongara, the director, had written the script for the film as well. Subramanian argued that the applicant was wrongly attempting to treat a shared theme or historical backdrop as copyright violation, stressing that the law protects only the original expression of ideas, not ideas themselves, themes, historical occurrences, social movements, or facts.
He further alleged that the application was filed at the last possible moment, pointing out that Parasakthi was slated for its OTT release on February 7. In response, Purushothaman said the producer's counter affidavit had been served on him barely an hour before the matter was taken up for hearing.
Hearing arguments from both sides, the Judge adjourned the case while stating that an injunction application would be taken up for hearing on February 9.
Parasakthi has been at the centre of many controversies since its release including the increase in negativity against the film, the team facing backlash for attending Pongal celebrations in Delhi and Sudha Kongara's comments on censor-related issues faced by the film. The film underperformed at the box office and was received with mixed reviews.
Parasakthi also stars Sreeleela in her Tamil debut and Atharvaa, in leading roles. The film's extended cast includes Kulappulli Leela, Prakash Belawadi, Dev Ramnath, Prithvi Rajan, Guru Somasundaram and Chetan, with cameo appearances from Rana Daggubati and Basil Joseph.