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NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Tuesday examined the evolving scope of personality rights while hearing a lawsuit filed by Indian cricketer Abhishek Sharma, who sought protection against the alleged unauthorized use of his name, image and likeness on online platforms, including content generated by artificial intelligence.The matter came before Justice Jyoti Singh, who scrutinized several web links identified by Sharma as allegedly violating his personality rights. During the hearing, the Court also made significant observations about the increasingly complex relationship between personality rights and defamation in the digital age.
Delhi HC flags between personality rights and defamation
While considering rival submissions, Justice Singh noted that disputes involving online content often blur the distinction between defamation and personality rights.“We also find this every day where there is a fine line between defamation and personal rights. That is ongoing. There is a bit of overlap. A defamatory matter can have a personal rights element,” Justice Singh observed.The court’s remarks came as it considered whether the disputed online content merely involved objectionable speech or constituted unauthorized exploitation of Sharma’s identity through artificial intelligence.
The dispute revolves around an image altered by artificial intelligence
Representing the Met, advocate Varun Pathak informed the court that out of the eight URLs currently under consideration, two are no longer available. Referring to one of the remaining links, Pathak stated that it appeared to be “some kind of paparazzi” and that, in his view, it did not constitute a violation of personality rights.Sharma’s advice, however, strongly disagrees with that characterization.Advocate Thakur, who was defending the cricketer, argued that the case did not involve an ordinary paparazzo photographer. Instead, he alleged that the original image of Sharma with her manager was allegedly manipulated using artificial intelligence by altering its appearance and context, resulting in a false AI-generated image.According to the plaintiff, the digitally altered image falsely gave a different impression and constituted an unauthorized use of Sharma’s personality and identity.Responding to the Court’s observations, Pathak argued that false or objectionable statements concerning an individual would normally fall within the domains of defamation or privacy rather than personality rights.He further argued that extending the personality rights requirement to all adverse online content would create serious practical difficulties for intermediaries.According to Meta, Sharma initially approached the court with about 25 URLs, but the number of allegedly infringing links later increased to nearly 4,000.Pathak argued that adopting such an expansive interpretation would effectively require intermediaries to “clean the internet” of content critical of the plaintiff, regardless of whether it actually violates personality rights.
The case was sent for further discussion
After hearing both sides, the Delhi High Court adjourned the case till July 9 for further consideration, noting that certain issues related to the suit required attention.The suit is among a growing number of personality rights cases before the Delhi High Court involving celebrities seeking protection against unauthorized commercial use or AI-powered manipulation of their names, photographs, likenesses and identities.With the rapid rise of artificial intelligence tools that can generate lifelike images and videos, courts are increasingly being asked to examine claims involving deepfakes, digitally altered content and the unauthorized use of public figures.
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