Aditya Dhar gets legal relief as court rejects filmmaker Santosh Kumar’s plea against Dhurandhar 2 OTT release amid plagiarism claims

Director Aditya Dhar received legal relief after a Mumbai civil court refused to stay the OTT release of Dhurandhar 2 amid allegations that the film was based on a copied script.

Filmmaker Santosh Kumar had approached the court seeking an ad-interim injunction against the digital release of the film, claiming that Dhar had used elements from his original script. However, the court rejected the plea, allowing the film's OTT rollout to proceed as scheduled.

Court finds no grounds for immediate injunction

According to Liv Law, in its order dated June 4, Judge Yunus Kharadi observed that Kumar had failed to disclose that he had previously filed a similar plea before the Karnataka High Court.



The Karnataka High Court had dismissed the petition while granting Kumar the liberty to pursue an appropriate remedy before a competent forum. The Mumbai court noted that this fact had not been disclosed in the present suit.

“But that fact was not disclosed by the plaintiff, that will prima facie show that he has not come with clean hands,” the court observed.

Plaintiff failed to establish similarities, says court

The court also took note of the defence's argument that Kumar had sought directions against an OTT platform without making any streaming service a party to the suit.

Additionally, the judge noted that no comparative material had been submitted to establish similarities between Kumar's script and the film.

“From the plaint and documents, no such comparison was produced by the plaintiff to show the similarity of script and dialogues and unless and until that is verified, the relief of injunction and appointment of the Court Commissioner cannot be granted,” the order stated.

The court further observed that rights connected to the film had already been created in favour of third parties, making an injunction impractical at this stage.

‘Balance of convenience’ favours defendants

Rejecting the plea, the court held that staying the release would result in greater harm to the defendants than the plaintiff.

“Hence, if ad interim relief is granted in favour of plaintiff, it will cause irreparable loss to the defendants. If the plaintiff succeeds in the suit, he can claim compensation; hence no irreparable loss would be caused to him,” the court said.

The judge concluded that the balance of convenience lay against the plaintiff and dismissed the request for interim relief.

Dhurandhar 2 premieres on OTT

The legal development comes as Dhurandhar 2 begins its OTT run following a successful theatrical release. The film premiered digitally on June 4 and is now streaming on JioHotstar.

Directed by Aditya Dhar, the sequel stars Ranveer Singh in the lead role alongside Sara Arjun, Gaurav Gera, Sanjay Dutt, R Madhavan, Rakesh Bedi and Arjun Rampal. The first film also featured Akshaye Khanna in a key role.

The franchise recently crossed the Rs 3,000 crore mark worldwide, becoming the first Indian film series to achieve the milestone.