Bollywood Has Better Deepfake Protection Than Britain (For Now)

If an AI chatbot impersonated a famous actor and sent users sexual remarks in her name, where would she rather sue: New Delhi or London? The honest answer today is New Delhi. The more interesting question is whether that will last.

The Delhi model: a judge-made shield

Start with a real case. In September 2025, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan asked the Delhi High Court to act against websites, merchandise sellers, YouTube channels and an AI chatbot. The chatbot impersonated her and engaged users in "personalised conversations" full of "sexually coloured remarks".¹ On 9 September 2025, Justice Tejas Karia granted an ex parte interim injunction. It restrained the defendants from using her name, image, likeness or any other attribute of her persona "through any medium or technology", expressly including AI, deepfakes, machine learning and face morphing.² The court said that unauthorised use of a celebrity's likeness causes commercial harm. It also said such use undermines her right to privacy and dignity.³

Her case was not unusual. In 2025 alone, the Delhi High Court gave similar protection to Sadhguru in June, and to Karan Johar, Abhishek Bachchan and the Telugu actor Nagarjuna in September.⁴ Johar's suit went beyond his face and voice. He also sought to stop the use of his nickname "KJo", memes and AI-generated content.⁵ By 2026 the list had grown to include Baba Ramdev, Allu Arjun, Varun Dhawan, Ravi Kishan and others, with every order aimed at AI deepfakes.⁶ In the Bachchans' related dispute, the court reportedly ordered 518 links taken down. The couple also asked YouTube to stop their likenesses from being used to train other AI systems.⁷

What stands out is that none of this rests on a single statute. India has no law that defines personality rights, so the courts decide each case as it comes.⁸ Claimants combine copyright, performers' rights, passing off and a free-standing claim to "personality rights" in a single suit.⁹ Courts have grounded that claim partly in privacy. They often cite the Supreme Court's 1994 decision in R Rajagopal as the source.¹⁰ They have also built a line of precedent, from Amitabh Bachchan v Rajat Negi in 2022 to Anil Kapoor v Simply Life India in 2023.¹¹ In Anil Kapoor, the court treated a celebrity's right of endorsement as a source of livelihood that cannot be taken without consent.¹²

The result works fast. A celebrity can file one suit and come away with an ex parte order covering named and unnamed defendants, platforms and future content.¹³ It is a remarkably effective remedy.

The English model: prove you were selling something

Now move the same chatbot to London. The first problem is that English law recognises no general image right. The Court of Appeal said so plainly in Fenty v Arcadia in 2015.¹⁴ Rihanna won her case against Topshop, but only through passing off. She had to prove three things: goodwill, a misrepresentation that she had endorsed the T-shirt, and damage.¹⁵ Context mattered to the outcome. Rihanna was a known style icon who had appeared in Topshop's own promotions. As Birss J put it, "Topshop is not a market stall."¹⁶ The other leading case is older. In Irvine v Talksport, a radio station edited Eddie Irvine's photograph so that he appeared to hold its radio. He recovered £25,000.¹⁷

Both cases are about false endorsement, and that is the limitation. Passing off protects trade. It does not protect identity. A deepfake that falsely suggests a celebrity backs a product may well satisfy the test, but the finding will turn heavily on the facts. Passing off also offers little to anyone without commercial goodwill to protect. Even for celebrities, there is a question whether viewers of a deepfake are really deceived into thinking the person approved it. A sexualised chatbot sells no T-shirts. It is hard to see how passing off reaches it at all.

The workarounds are partial. Some sportspeople have turned to trade marks. Luke Littler has registered his face, and Cole Palmer has registered his autograph, his facial image and "Cold Palmer".¹⁸ But a trade mark must signal where goods come from. A fake advert using Littler's face deceives people about who he is, not necessarily about the trade origin of a product.¹⁹ Data protection may help, since an identifiable face or voice can be personal data.²⁰ The criminal law now covers intimate deepfakes. Section 188 of the Online Safety Act 2023 criminalises sharing intimate images without consent, and section 138 of the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 criminalises creating them or asking someone else to create them.²¹ But neither offence addresses commercial misuse of a person's voice or likeness.

The Government accepts there is a gap. Its March 2026 report on copyright and AI admitted that "existing protections do not give most individuals meaningful control of their image or voice or access to realistic remedies". It also promised to consider "whether a new personality right may be appropriate".²² A consultation on digital replicas was promised for summer 2026.²³ As of September, the Government was still saying it would consult. In the same month, the actors' union Equity used the TUC congress to renew its call for a personality right.²⁴

The twist: Delhi is now slowing down

On that evidence, the headline holds. A Bollywood star facing an AI impersonator is better protected than a British one. But this is where the story gets more interesting, because the Delhi High Court has started to doubt its own success.

In September 2026, Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani grouped three suits together, brought by Janhvi Kapoor, Vivek Oberoi and Aaradhya Bachchan, to decide what personality rights actually cover.²⁵ He described the doctrine as a "monolithic block of clay or wood" in which he could not yet "discern any design". He said the court would chip away until "a definitive face emerges".²⁶ His frustration was practical. "Started with something small, done with all good intentions. Now we are sitting at 6884 URLs," he said. He had already refused a blanket takedown of fan pages because of the risk to free speech.²⁷ In the Aaradhya Bachchan case he warned that personality rights were "acquiring amoebic proportions".²⁸

The amici's submissions in October 2026 read almost like an English lawyer's critique. Rohan Alva reviewed about 65 Delhi decisions. He told the court that once a celebrity is shown to be involved, the injunction tends to follow almost automatically.²⁹ He proposed splitting claims into five categories: commercial misuse, works about a celebrity, obscene content and deepfakes, impersonation, and speech about a celebrity. Only the last would require case-by-case balancing. He argued that commercial misuse should be treated as a property right "similar to passing off", because "I can't really say that it is my right to privacy to advertise myself on a billboard." Deepfake pornography, by contrast, would rest on privacy, because no one can consent to it in advance. He even argued that courts have misread Rajagopal as a privacy authority. The platforms raised the cost of the current approach. One counsel described a plaintiff who had flagged 26,000 URLs under a single dynamic injunction. Another described a court injuncting an accurate news report.³⁰

What each system can learn

So the more accurate claim is narrower than my title. Bollywood has faster and broader deepfake protection than Britain. Breadth, though, comes at a price. India's omnibus suits protect stars well, but they can also catch fans, critics and journalists, and the Delhi High Court is now trying to rein them in. England has the opposite problem. Its protection is principled and narrow, and it largely fails anyone whose harm is to dignity rather than to trade.

The striking thing is that the two systems are moving towards each other. Delhi's amicus wants commercial claims judged by something close to passing off.³¹ Westminster is considering a statutory right that would go beyond passing off. If the UK consultation does open, it could learn from Delhi in both directions. A targeted right against non-consensual digital replicas would fill the gap that Fenty leaves. Clear categories and free-speech carve-outs from the start would avoid the 6,884-URL problem.

Most Indian orders discussed here are interim injunctions, many granted ex parte, and should not be read as final rulings. The Delhi High Court's batch hearing was continuing at the time of writing (October 2026).

Notes

1.     Aishwarya Rai Bachchan v Aishwaryaworld.com CS(COMM) 956/2025, 2025 SCC OnLine Del 5943 (Del HC, 9 September 2025).

2.     ibid.

3.     'Aishwarya Rai Bachchan Personality Rights Upheld by Delhi HC against AI Misuse, Unauthorised Products' (The Hindu, 11 September 2025) https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Delhi/delhi-hc-protects-aishwarya-rai-bachchans-personality-rights-against-ai-misuse-unauthorised-products/article70037113.ece accessed 28 October 2026.

4.     Aakriti Bansal, 'Delhi HC to Clarify Personality Rights through Janhvi Kapoor, Aaradhya Bachchan and Vivek Oberoi Suits' (MediaNama, 29 September 2026) https://www.medianama.com/2026/09/223-delhi-hc-define-personality-rights/ accessed 28 October 2026 (running tracker); Akkineni Nagarjuna v www.bfxxx.org 2025 SCC OnLine Del 6331.

5.     Karan Johar v Ashok Kumar CS(COMM) 974/2025, 2025 SCC OnLine Del 6108 (Del HC, 17 September 2025); 'Delhi High Court Protects Personality Rights of Filmmaker Karan Johar, Orders Take Down of Disparaging Posts, Memes' (LiveLaw, September 2025) https://www.livelaw.in/high-court/delhi-high-court/delhi-high-court-protects-personality-rights-of-filmmaker-karan-johar-orders-take-down-of-disparaging-posts-memes-304487 accessed 28 October 2026.

6.     Bansal (n 4).

7.     'Spooked by AI, Bollywood Stars Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai Drag Google into Fight for Personality Rights' (The Straits Times, Reuters, 2025) https://www.straitstimes.com/life/entertainment/spooked-by-ai-bollywood-stars-abhishek-bachchan-and-aishwarya-rai-drag-google-into-fight-for accessed 28 October 2026.

8.     Bansal (n 4).

9.     'Delhi HC Grants Interim Injunction Protecting Aishwarya Rai's Personality Rights' (SCC Online Blog, 12 September 2025) https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2025/09/12/del-hc-protects-aishwarya-rais-personality-rights/ accessed 28 October 2026; 'Delhi High Court Protects Karan Johar's Personality Rights' (SCC Online Blog, 22 September 2025) https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2025/09/22/delhi-hc-protects-karan-johars-personality-rights/ accessed 28 October 2026.

10.  R Rajagopal v State of Tamil Nadu (1994) 6 SCC 632.

11.  Amitabh Bachchan v Rajat Negi (2022) 6 HCC (Del) 641, 2022 SCC OnLine Del 4110; Anil Kapoor v Simply Life India 2023 SCC OnLine Del 6914.

12.  Anil Kapoor (n 11).

13.  'Karan Johar, Aishwarya, and Abhishek Bachchan Seek Personality Rights Protection in Delhi HC' (MediaNama, 16 September 2025) https://www.medianama.com/2025/09/223-karan-johar-aishwarya-abhishek-personality-rights-delhi-hc/ accessed 28 October 2026; 'Delhi HC Calls for Sanity in Personality-Rights Cases' (Mint, 2026) https://www.livemint.com/news/india/janhvi-kapoor-personality-rights-case-delhi-high-court-free-speech-11786439794117.html accessed 28 October 2026.

14.  Fenty v Arcadia Group Brands Ltd (t/a Topshop) [2015] EWCA Civ 3.

15.  Fenty v Arcadia Group Brands Ltd (t/a Topshop) [2013] EWHC 2310 (Ch).

16.  ibid.

17.  Irvine v Talksport Ltd [2002] EWHC 367 (Ch); Irvine v Talksport Ltd [2003] EWCA Civ 423.

18.  UK Trade Mark No UK00004350490 (Luke Littler); Mills & Reeve, 'All UK Trade Marks Applications Filed on Behalf of Cole Palmer Now Granted' https://www.mills-reeve.com/news/all-uk-trade-marks-applications-filed-on-behalf-of-cole-palmer-now-granted/ accessed 28 October 2026.

19.  Trade Marks Act 1994, s 1(1); Hamlins, 'Luke Littler's "Face Trade Mark" – IP Strategy in the Era of Deepfakes' https://hamlins.com/insight/luke-littlers-face-trade-mark-ip-strategy-in-the-era-of-deepfakes/ accessed 28 October 2026.

20.  UK GDPR, art 4(1).

21.  Online Safety Act 2023, s 188; Data (Use and Access) Act 2025, s 138.

22.  Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and Department for Culture, Media and Sport, Report on Copyright and Artificial Intelligence (18 March 2026), as quoted in Mills & Reeve, 'AI, Deepfakes and Image Rights: Does English Law Protect Your Face, Voice and Likeness?' https://www.mills-reeve.com/publications/ai-deepfakes-and-image-rights-does-english-law-protect-your-face-voice-and-likeness/ accessed 28 October 2026.

23.  A&O Shearman, 'Where Are We on Copyright and AI in the UK?' https://www.aoshearman.com/en/insights/ao-shearman-on-tech/where-are-we-on-copyright-and-ai-in-the-uk accessed 28 October 2026.

24.  Equity, 'TUC Backs Equity Position on AI Personality Rights' (15 September 2026) https://www.equity.org.uk/news/2026/tuc-backs-equity-position-on-ai-personality-rights accessed 28 October 2026; Equity, 'Equity Responds to Louise Haigh's Comments on AI: Performers Need Personality Rights Now' (September 2026) https://www.equity.org.uk/news/2026/equity-responds-to-louise-haigh-s-comments-on-ai-performers-need-personality-rights-now accessed 28 October 2026.

25.  'Delhi High Court to Decide Personality Rights Cases of 3 Celebrities Together' (Bar & Bench, 28 September 2026) https://www.barandbench.com/news/delhi-high-court-to-decide-personality-rights-cases-of-3-celebrities-together accessed 28 October 2026.

26.  Bansal (n 4).

27.  ibid; Janhvi Kapoor v Ashok Kumar/John Doe CS(COMM) 868/2026 (Del HC, 11 August 2026).

28.  'Personality Rights Cases: What Issues Are Indian Courts Really Considering?' (MediaNama, September 2026) https://www.medianama.com/2026/09/223-personality-rights-indian-courts/ accessed 28 October 2026.

29.  Aakriti Bansal, '"Who's a Celebrity?" Delhi HC Asks in Vivek Oberoi Personality Rights Case; Amicus Proposes 5-Category Test' (MediaNama, 6 October 2026) https://www.medianama.com/2026/10/223-delhi-hc-personality-rights-amicus/ accessed 28 October 2026.

30.  ibid.

31.  ibid; Aakriti Bansal, 'Profiting from a Celebrity's Image Not Enough for Takedowns: Amicus in Janhvi Kapoor Case' (MediaNama, 7 October 2026) https://www.medianama.com/2026/10/223-profit-takedowns-janhvi-kapoor-personality-rights/ accessed 28 October 2026.