Kerala High Court refuses to stay release of Mohanlal starrer 'Neru' on plea alleging plagiarism

The Kerala High Court on Wednesday refused to stay the release of the Mohanlal starrer movie Neru which is scheduled to hit the big screen on Thursday, December 21. .Justice Devan Ramachandran, however, issued notice to the respondents including the Central government, director-cum-writer Jeethu Joseph and co-writer advocate Santhi Mayadevi. .The petition was moved by one Deepu K Unni who alleged that the script for the movie was plagiarised from a screenplay that he had written.Unni claimed that he had put together a script about an "emotional family drama", featuring a court story with a female and male lawyer as the protagonists, which was later sent to the makers of Neru. Unni alleged that he met with Joseph and Mayadevi on several occasions to extensively discuss this script. He claimed that Joseph and Mayadevi were impressed by the script and assured Unni that Joseph's next film would feature this script. Unni further submitted that he was forced to hand over copies of his script to Joseph and Mayadevi, who purportedly told him that they needed the help of expert lawyers to understand the court drama sequence in the script. According to Unni's petition, he never heard back from them on his script. However, the trailer released for Neru has sequences that are exact replicas of those contained in his script, Unni asserted. He added that the film's title also has a tagline similar to that of his script, namely an "Emotional Court Drama.".Therefore, he approached the High Court seeking directions so that the movie would not be released or exhibited. .The petitioner (Deepu K Unni) was represented by advocates BA Aloor, Rebin Vincent Gralan, Haseeb Hassan M, Suchithra PS, Kishnasankar D and Ailin Elezabath Mathew. .Follow Bar and Bench channel on WhatsAppDownload the Bar and Bench Mobile app for instant access to the latest legal news.