Recently, actor Amitabh Bachchan had moved the Delhi High Court after a fake lottery ran using his name and voice. In line with his personality rights, the court said his voice, face and pictures can’t be used without his permission anymore.

Safir Anand, who represented the actor in court, tells us: “The lottery showed an endorsement by Mr Bachchan, saying, ‘Yeh toh zaroor khelo’. That prompted him to go to court.”

However, the court order cast doubts on how the ruling would affect those who mimic the actor and make a living by performing in live shows. “Parody isn’t infringement,” Anand clarifies, as he goes on to cite the example of a situation where Bachchan is sitting in the audience while someone impersonates him on stage: “It is not against mimicry artists, but misrepresentation. There is a fine line between what is mimicry and what’s not. One argument can be that mimicry has a commercial angle to it. Technically, you are exploiting someone’s name in order to make gains. Why can’t you take permission?”

Then, there’s the kind of mimicry that is disparaging. “Someone comes on stage and makes a joke on him, or there is a fictional conversation between a father and son on the success of Abhishek (Bachchan, actor-son), or a derogatory comment is made on Aishwarya (Rai Bachchan, actor, daughter-in-law)... All these are overdoing the personality rights of celebs,” he shares.