Bombay HC pushes Rock On 2 dispute for an early hearing on April 7

The Bombay High Court on Wednesday posted the Rock On-II dispute for hearing on April 7.
Abhishek Kapoor, writer and director of the 2008 hit film Rock On!! is in no mood to ask the film’s star Farhan Akhtar to rock on with the sequel till he gets credit as its joint- story writer. Kapoor moved the Bombay High Court against Akhtar and his business associate Ritesh Sidhwani at Excel Entertainment as well as Rock On's joint script-writer Pubali Chaudhuri over the film’s proposed sequel, alleging violation of his rights over the story and script and demanded a stay on its progress.He wants a declaration that he is the joint writer of the sequel's story and script.
Akhtar and Sidhwani’s company Excel Entertainment had produced Rock On and had entered into an agreement with Kapoor as writer and director, for making three films based on his story. As producers, Excel Entertainment, had through an agreement, retained perpetually all future intellectual property rights over the film, its story, script, sequels and prequels. Kapoor’s claim now is that he was a newbie writer and director back then and lacked the bargaining power against established production houses like Excel.
The matter came up before Justice S C Gupte on Wednesday where Akhtar's counsel Virendra Tulzapurkar said the sequel has "not even hit the floor yet'' and that he would file the reply. He also said that no equities would be created till then in the producer's favour.
Kapoor's counsel Biren Saraf and Hitesh Jain said the matter is important since his credit as a writer of the sequel is at stake. The court posted the matter for final disposal in the first week of April. Tulzapurkar sought a longer date for the next hearing which Saraf opposed saying that the producers ought to then give notice of any rights created over the movie. The judge then posted it for an early hearing.
Abhishek Kapoor’s suit in the HC states that Pubali Chaudhuri and Excel Entertainment should stop producing and releasing any film which includes characters from his film and which are based on a story he had mailed Pubali in September 2011 or which is based on a draft script of Rock On 2.
He alleges that Pubali, his co-writer on the script has “clandestinely’’ registered the script for the sequel as hers and that even Excel claims to have entered into an agreement with her alone for a script for the sequel.
Kapoor wants the HC to restrain Akhtar and Sidhwani from “developing and continuing the story of RO 2 in any manner.’’
READ: Rock On 2 to be shot in Shillong
He also wants “disclosure of agreements or contracts, if any, executed with actors, artists, writers, lyricist, cast, crew etc in relation to said sequel based on script of RO-II,’’ and also account of any amounts already received for rights granted, if any.
The fight Kapoor says is because of a possible breach of a contract of three films on an original story he came up with. In 2005, his court document says that he had “conceived a novel idea of a story revolving around a group of friends who are musicians and their lives, their struggles and the manner in which they overcome their struggles and form a musical band.’’ He put the idea into a script and in December 2006 entered into an agreement with Pubali to engage her services in writing the dialogue and the screenplay for the movie (titled Magik ) then on work on hire basis. Her name would feature in the film credits as screen play writer he said. In 2007, Excel approached Kapoor and requested him to write and direct three films to be financed and produced by it, his suit says.
READ: Abhishek files case against Farhan Akhtar
He got Rs 25 lah for the first film. For the second, the remuneration as director would be mutually decided based on the commercial success of the first film. The director, Kapoor, had agreed irrevocably to assign exclusive license in favour of producers over any existing or emerging rights from the director’s creative work including the story, conceptualization, literary and dramatic work even its sequel.
Kapoor, however, says that when the agreement granting all rights over the film’s story and sequel was given to the producers Excel, he had “just begun his career as a writer and director and that he had low bargaining power compared to an established production company.’’ He said the agreement was prepared by Akhtar’s company and contained clauses in the company’s favour to claim rights in perpetuity over the film, which came to be titled Rock On.
Kapoor got credit as writer and director for the film which grossed Rs 380 million world wide and also earned him a Filmfare award for best story.
Regarding the film’s sequel, it was “to begin from where it ended in RO-I.’ It was decided to be called Rock On 2 -The Sound of India Kapoor started work on its script and Pubali was to work jointly with him. He sent the script in 2011 to her. Then the mail exchanges began.
His suit says he received a mail from her few days later saying she was being asked to add new characters. He was ‘’not happy with a character she added”, but jointly developed the script further.
In February 2012, he wrote to Sidhwani and sent him soft copy of the script.
But in August 2013, Pubali went ahead and registered the script as her own, in a “clandestine manner’’ with the Film writers Association followed by filing a complaint against him with the dispute settlement committee of the association, denying his contributions to the script. She said his contribution to the story is only as director's input though her mails had acknowledged him as a co-writer.
Kapoor said even Excel Entertainment in November 2014 said it had entered into an agreement for a script of RO 2 from Pubali. Kapoor claims that such an agreement would be void when the earlier one with him exists for three films.
LISTEN: Songs of Rock On!! on Gaana.com
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WATCH: Rock On!! director moves HC against Farhan Akhtar to stall the sequel - TOI