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Informist, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025

 

 

NEW DELHI – The Delhi High Court has refused to reject Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd.'s plea seeking to restrain Mohalla Tech Pvt. Ltd. from accessing on its platforms the copyright content of Zee Entertainment, noting that it does have the jurisdiction to hear the case. The high court rejected Mohalla Tech's application that sought rejection of Zee Entertainment's plea on account of the court not having jurisdiction to hear the case.

 

 

Zee Entertainment has asserted its statutory rights with regard to copyright in its works, said the court. Hence, the terms of the agreement and the licence agreement between the parties relating to jurisdiction of Mumbai courts will not govern the present dispute, said the court. None of the reliefs sought in Zee Entertainment's plea pertain to the agreements. The argument of Mohalla Tech that the courts in Mumbai have exclusive jurisdiction on the basis of the agreements is, therefore, misplaced and cannot be accepted, said the court.

 

It is apparent that the platforms of Mohalla Tech, namely ShareChat and Moj, by way of their in-built music libraries, make accessible to the users the copyright works of Zee Entertainment, said the court. In other words, a user can search, view, download and add the copyright works of Zee Entertainment to their content in order to create and upload their content on the platforms, which in turn is also visible and accessible to other users of the platforms, said the court. Thus, it would not be appropriate to state that there is no interaction on the platforms of Mohalla Tech with respect to Zee Entertainment's copyright works within the jurisdiction of this court, said Justice Mini Pushkarna.

 

Mohalla Tech's platforms and websites are accessible all over India, including Delhi, noted the court, adding that a part of the cause of action has arisen in Delhi. Section 20(c) of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 accords "dominus litis" to the plaintiff to institute a suit before a court, within local limits of whose jurisdiction, the cause of action wholly or in part arises, said Justice Pushkarna.

 

"...this court is of the considered view that reading of the plaint and the documents filed along with the plaint clearly discloses that part of the cause of action for the reliefs, as claimed in the present suit, arises within the territorial jurisdiction of this court," said Justice Pushkarna. Accordingly, the present suit by Zee Entertainment is maintainable, and the high court has territorial jurisdiction to adjudicate the disputes as raised in the present suit, she added.

 

Zee Entertainment is the owner of a large number of copyrights in sound recordings and sound audio visuals, music videos and also, the underlying musical and literary works embodied therein, belonging both to the film and non-film genre, in both Hindi and regional languages. The plaintiff has the sole and exclusive right to exhibit, distribute and exploit the said works, in any manner. Mohalla Tech is the owner of "ShareChat", a social networking system platform and "Moj" application, which is a short-video platform used for sharing content. The platforms of Mohalla Tech allow its users to use licensed music to create short-form video and audio content to share with their viewers. 

 

The past relation between Zee Entertainment and Mohalla Tech arises from two agreements, namely, the User Content and Revenue Sharing Agreement in 2023 and the License agreement in 2020. In the user content agreement, the parties mutually agreed that Mohalla Tech would supply, host and distribute Zee Entertainment's long-form audio-visual and music videos, in order to make it available on the defendant's platforms. This user content agreement was terminated in the same year. Under the licence agreement, Mohalla Tech was provided the licence to store the content of sound records owned and controlled by Zee Entertainment, for the defendant's users. This licence agreement was not renewed by Zee Entertainment in 2023.

 

In and around August 2023, Zee Entertainment during its routine review got to know that Mohalla Tech's online platforms were without any valid license or authorisation, using the plaintiff's copyright in various sound recordings, including, any parts and underlying literary and musical works thereof, through its inbuilt library. Seeking an injunction on the same, Zee Entertainment moved the high court.

 

At 1314 IST, shares of Zee Entertainment Enterprises were down 0.4% at INR 93.30 on the National Stock Exchange.  End

 

IST, or Indian Standard Time, is five-and-a-half hours ahead of GMT

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

 

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