Star India Pvt. Ltd. v. Haneeth Ujwal & Ors.
(2014) 60 PTC 504
In the High Court of Delhi
CS (OS) 2243/2014
Before Justice Manmohan Singh
Decided on July 28, 2014

Relevancy of the case: Directions for domain name registrars to disclose domain ownership details in a case involving the violation of the plaintiff’s exclusive broadcasting rights

Statutes and Provisions Involved

• The Copyright Act, 1957 (Section 37, 39A, 55)
• The Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (Section 80, 151, Order XXIII Rule 1, Order XXXIX Rule 1, 2, 3)

Relevant Facts of the Case

• Star Sports is a leading sports broadcaster covering various sporting events in different sports fields, such as Badminton, F1, Football, Tennis, and Hockey.
• The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) gave Star Sports exclusive rights to broadcast the 2014 cricket series between England and India and exploit these broadcasting rights.
• The defendant owns the website that displays content similar to Star Sports without their or ECB’s authorisation.

Prominent Arguments by the Advocates

• The plaintiff’s counsel argued that whoever chooses to broadcast, retransmit, or host the consent must seek authorisation from ECB or Star Sports. Otherwise, it would violate its exclusive broadcasting rights. The defendant’s website broadcasts such content without appropriate authorisation, and the domain owner hides behind domain privacy services, making it impossible to contact the website owners.
• Further, the counsel submitted that despite several notices, these rogue websites have not complied with the plaintiff’s legitimate demands.

Opinion of the Bench

• The bench referred to the plaintiff’s statement and noted that the websites are faceless entities that are difficult to locate.

Final Decision

• The bench passed interim orders, directing the domain name registrars to disclose the contact details of the rogue websites. Further, the bench restricted the defendant’s website from broadcasting any content related to the 2014 India-England cricket series.

Yagyanseni Acharya, an undergraduate student at VIT School of Law, Chennai, prepared this case summary during her internship with The Cyber Blog India in January/February 2024.