Delhi High Court guides whatsapp to remove illicit groups circulating Dainik Bhaskar owned e-newspapers

Delhi High Court guides whatsapp to remove illicit groups circulating Dainik Bhaskar owned e-newspapers

According to the Delhi High Court, Whatsapp should remove or block groups of Unauthorized and illegally circulating the e-newspaper owned by Dainik Bhaskar Corp. Ltd.

In his dissenting opinion, Justice Sanjeev Narula opined that Dainik Bhaskar Corp. Ltd., the plaintiff has made out a prima facie case and claimed that it would suffer irreparable loss if an ex-parte order of injunction is not granted against those illegally circulating and disseminating its e-newspaper.

The Dainik Bhaskar Corp. Ltd. owns the trademarks "Dainik Bhaskar", "Divya Bhaskar," "Divya Marathi" and "Bhaskar Group"

The case was filed against WhatsApp LLC as the number one defendant and against people who had set up WhatsApp groups and were circulating e-newspapers illegally as defendants Nos. 3 to 88. Accordingly, a lawsuit was filed asking for an ex-parte injunction restraining the Defendants from infringing or enabling the infringement of the plaintiff's copyrights and trademarks.

Plaintiff claimed it began distributing e-newspapers through its websites "epaper.bhaskar.com" and "epaper.diyyabhaskar.com" on a subscription basis. In addition to the websites, Dainik Bhaskar also offers its e-newspapers and e-magazines through its mobile phone application.

Plaintiff was unaware of any other WhatsApp groups where e-newspapers were unauthorized and illegally shared and had therefore submitted that there might be many more.

Plaintiff argued that it owned the copyright in the e-newspaper, along with news articles and content on its websites and mobile application, and that these could not be unauthorized distributed.

In the meantime, Defendant No. 1 is ordered to disable/block the WhatsApp groups identified under paragraph 7 of the present application, which is unauthorized and illegally circulating the Plaintiff's e-newspaper," the Court ruled.

A roster bench hearing will now take place on May 2, 2022.

Title: DB CORP LTD v. WHATSAPP LLC & ORS.