New Delhi: The Delhi High Court today has dismissed the plea by fugitive Indian Businessman Mehul Choksi seeking a preview of Netflix’s “Bad Boy Billionaires” releasing on September 2.
A single-judge Bench of Justice Navin Chawla has said he can file a civil suit as what is being alleged as an infringement by him is a private right and can be exercised in a civil suit.
The Court also refused to grant him a preview stating that there are no regulations to control the content being streamed on OTT platforms, citing a similar order passed by the division bench of the high court in a different matter.
The Netflix series will shed some light on the lives of fraud-accused businessmen Vijay Mallya, Mehul Choksi, his cousin Nirav Modi, among others and will explore what built up and brought down some of India’s most infamous business tycoons. The businessman, Choksi and others are being probed by the ED on money laundering charges in connection with an over US $2 billion alleged bank fraud at a Punjab National Bank (PNB) branch in Mumbai.
The petition, filed by lawyer Vijay Aggarwal, said that Choksi got to know of the documentary’s release on August 24 when he saw the trailer. As the Netflix series features Choksi’s nephew Nirav Modi who’s also the co-accused in the case, it may prejudice the investigation and trial against him. He had sought a direction to restrain Netflix from releasing the portion which would be prejudicial to his rights of fair investigation and trial.
On the previous hearing, Senior Advocate Neeraj Kishan Kaul on behalf of Netflix informed the Court that only two minutes out of the entire series are devoted to Mehul Choksi. The show is on Nirav Modi and whatever is shown is already in public domain.
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Mr Kaul had also questioned the validity of the petition, and stated that Netflix being an OTT platform which aren’t regulated by government authorities, petitioners could have either filed a suit or made a representation as per Section 69A of the Information Technology Act.
-India Legal Bureau